Law Professor Ma Jinfang: Winning women's football & Xuzhou eight-child mother, they are us

Ma Jinfang is a professor, doctoral supervisor and vice dean of the Law School of East China University of Political Science and Law, a doctor of law, the vice president of the Shanghai Youth Research Association, a director of the Jurisprudence Research Society of the China Law Society, and a director of the Social Law Research Society of the China Law Society

If you feel the pain, then you are alive.

If you feel the pain of others,

Well, you are the person.

--Leo Tolstoy

The circle of friends on February 6, 2022 belongs to Chinese women: on the one hand, the supreme glory of the women's football team winning the championship, on the other hand, the widespread concern about the abduction of women and children triggered by the "mother of eight children" incident in Feng County, Xuzhou.

Chinese women thus present two diametrically opposed faces – on the one hand, the rainbow of rain and rainbows, and on the other hand, the extremely vulnerable and urgent need to be cared for. Perhaps, this in itself is not the opposite. In the case of the former, it is extremely difficult – Chinese women, and indeed women of the world, need to pay more or even several times more effort to achieve the same achievements and honors; in the case of the latter, it is extremely easy - falling prey to poverty, ignorance, tradition and even institutions is an easy task.

In essence, this extreme difficulty has the same or similar roots as the extremely easy. Or rather, these are two aspects of the same thing. We, all of us, have mothers; half of all of us are women ourselves; the vast majority of men have wives; most families have children; nearly half of the couples have daughters.

Therefore, the object of trafficking in women and children is related to almost everyone. Bing Xin said: If there is no woman in the world, the world will lose at least five-tenths of its truth, six-tenths of its goodness, and seven-tenths of its beauty. Everything about women is the yardstick of social civilization. The degree of civilization in modern society is directly proportional to the subjectivity of women, and to the degree to which women are cared for, respected and cared for.

The harder it is for a woman to become herself as a subject, the easier it is to become an objectified object; and vice versa. The healthier a society is, the higher the ceiling that women encounter when they stretch upwards, and the stronger the foundations for women to seek basic safety and security downwards,—— can fully develop themselves and retreat to preserve themselves.

Women's football team winning the championship is a successful example of Chinese women breaking through the ceiling, breaking the ceiling upwards, and fully opening the limitations of self-development. This is the ultimate brilliant bloom that has been storing energy for a long time. Behind this brilliance, it means not knowing how many self-boundaries are constantly broken, how many people are famous or nameless, and how many heartbreaking stories or poignant accidents there are.

The Fengxian incident is a bloody fact that the lower limit has been broken and the minimum security of women has been destroyed. It is like the longitudinal face of a pustule, where the ugliest, the ugliest, the most evil crimes and atrocities cascade upon each other. Behind this dirtiness, it means that many people in this society have lost their basic security for survival. Among them, I don't know how many evil black hands, I don't know how many families are broken, I don't know how many people can never go back to the past.

There are mostly the following reasons for paying special attention to or attaching importance to a thing: either there is pain in the skin, or it can be felt empathy, or it is caused by ideals and feelings, or there is a purpose of research. We cheer for the women's football team, which is not only for their glory and glory for the country, but also to a certain extent, from the feelings of comparing the performance of the men's football team.

We speak out for the mother of eight children in FengXian County and even for all abducted women and children, not only because we are all born to women, the vast majority of people will be parents, but also because all of them are "the same kind", hurting their kind, rabbits and foxes. The beloved whom we are willing to care for with love and life would be so distraught that it would be worse to live than to die if it suffered a similar fate. How unacceptable it would be if such a crime, which violates the bottom line of human conscience and morality, could not be effectively curbed and punished with an equivalent punishment.

What is doubly comforting is that the Fengxian incident and the discussion it triggered have not been drowned in the splendor of festivals and grandeur, and the continuous voice of various self-media and non-governmental organizations has made the relevant questions continue to deepen. This goes far beyond the usual rule of "seven-day memory" on the Internet. In the national jubilant Chinese New Year's Eve, the Spring Festival and the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games, and the brush screen of the women's football team winning the championship, there are still posts from all analytical angles that are tenacious relay. Most people in Feng County have attracted widespread attention this time because they have natural feelings of having children and sisters, and some people are social concerns caused by social responsibility and simple sense of justice.

Before becoming a mother, I was more willing to be a big self with the world in mind; after becoming a mother, I was more of a small self with children and a loving mother. Once, I thought that this big me and the little self squeezed each other's space. However, just today, I suddenly realized that this "big me" and the "small self" itself are not at odds. The fairness and justice advocated by a society is meaningless if it is not implemented in every individual. To be a mother, you need not only a thousand soft hearts, but also a strong and unbreakable ambition.

If what used to be more of an abstract indignation about this crime is now a loud cry that incorporates inner emotions. Through the dim light of the nursing lamp, while typing on the mobile phone, I turned my head from time to time to look at the doll who subconsciously turned to her mother even in her sleep, and I had the firmness of a block in my chest.

The subtle complexity of human nature is far beyond imagination. You can never predict what kind of brilliance and power human nature can bloom under a certain circumstance, and you can never predict how ugly and vicious human nature can be. The controversial Stanford Prison experiment showed that circumstances can gradually change a person's personality, and circumstances can immediately change a person's behavior. A mild-mannered gentleman can, in some cases, turn into a bloodthirsty maniac. Moreover, in an environment that has always been ignorant, poor, vicious, and closed, perhaps bestiality has become the most natural choice, or even a natural instinct that does not need to be chosen at all.

Legislation and amendments are not easy in themselves, but comprehensive governance outside the law is even more difficult. Even within the community of legal persons and among criminal law scholars, there are very different understandings and suggestions on the crimes and penalties of abducting and trafficking in women and children and bribing them. Moreover, like other social norms, laws undoubtedly have their own limitations. The problem of abduction and bribery of women and children, born out of poverty and ignorance, closure and cruelty, stubbornness and greed, cannot be solved at the normative level alone. Since most of the trafficking relies on the industrial chain, then the fight against trafficking will inevitably require social system engineering. Trafficking in women and children is like cancer or cancer, the root cause is that the internal environment is bad, so it is not enough to cut off the lesions, we must start with changing the overall environment.

Looking at the affirmative action movement and other social changes in China and abroad, most of them emerge like the tip of the iceberg. But it is this corner that often becomes an opportunity to tear apart the truth and force the root cause. Some things seem difficult but may not be impossible to do, while some things, although simple and crisp, are difficult to operate.

But if it is difficult and more meaningful, we will give it meaning. A healthy society is inseparable from respect for the strong, but also from the protection of the weak. In a healthy society, women can not only break through the ceiling and fully bloom their own brilliance and charm, but also keep the bottom line and obtain the most basic safety, security and dignity. We look forward to our next generation: they can meet their true selves, they can stay with the best of themselves, they can go to the golden iron horse or the small bridge, they can choose to be smooth or they can have capital. But this freely chosen sky is inseparable from a solid earth as a foundation.

Tonight, we need to drum up not only the sports and achievements that push the limits of human beings, but also the crime of breaking through the bottom line of human conscience and morality. Because the former presents the glory and beauty of Chinese women, and the latter reveals the hardships and sufferings of Chinese women.

Tonight, we realize that the glory without a ceiling and an unlimited limit needs the guarantee of the bottom line, and this guarantee is the guarantee of the basic safety, survival and rights and interests of women.

Tonight, we realize that they are not us, but they are us. When we don't insist on being us, then we can be them.

We hope that in this historical process, women can be strong in the face of thorns, and they are not afraid to become so-called weak.

We are in history, and we are history itself.

Editor: Zhao Xin