Chinese University Expels Woman for ‘Improper Contact' With a Foreigner
The announcement set off heated debate in China. Some commentators applauded the decision and said that Chinese people — particularly women — were too enamored of foreigners. But others said the expulsion smacked of sexism and paternalism, and compared it to examples of people accused of rape or sexual harassment on campus who had been punished more lightly.
Many also criticized the university, Dalian Polytechnic University, in northeastern China, for publicly shaming the student by posting its expulsion notice on its website last week and identifying the student by her full name.
'If there is anyone who truly undermined national dignity in this case, it was not the woman whose privacy rights were violated,' Zhao Hong, a professor of law at Peking University in Beijing, wrote in an opinion column, 'but the online spectators who frantically humiliated an ordinary woman under the banner of so-called justice, and the educational institution that used stale moral commandments.'
The university said the student's conduct, in an incident it said took place on Dec. 16, had 'caused a negative impact.' It gave no details, but said the student was being punished in accordance with a university regulation about 'civic morality.'
That regulation reads: 'Those who have improper contact with foreigners and damage the national dignity and the reputation of the school shall be given a demerit or above, depending on the circumstances.'
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