Recently, the “Civilian Human Trafficking Interceptors” Shangguan Zhengyi exposed some villagers’ homes in the Shennongjia Forest Area where disabled individuals, ranging from as few as 2 to as many as 5, are kept as slaves, performing extremely harsh physical labor without compensation. If they disobey, they are beaten, and they have been enslaved for over a decade. Over these years, many disabled people have died due to overwork, extremely poor living conditions, frequent beatings, and other reasons. However, in the official records, their deaths are uniformly recorded as “normal deaths.”
But the fact is, as early as June 17, 2022, Bilibili uploader “Qiong You de Sui Shui Nian Hua” had already seen such unconditional forced labor slaves in Shennongjia. One lived in a very dilapidated, damp house, with his left hand beaten useless, a broken front tooth, only able to wear stinky clothes, eating only two meals of rice with pickles a day, feeding pigs daily. Another squatted, chopping firewood endlessly for the owner. In the cases reported by Shangguan Zhengyi, are these slaves really disabled? Not necessarily. The two in the video: the first can speak normally and communicate, while the second appears silent, but when the uploader asked him, he did respond, just cautiously looking around to other directions, wary of being discovered. These indicate that they both have relatively normal intelligence, at least aware that they are being enslaved and watched. Based on past exposure of human trafficking cases, many disabled people are not born disabled but are maimed through various means by traffickers.
Like the words quoted by Marx from Tangning: “If there is a 10% profit, capital will ensure it is used everywhere; with 20% profit, capital can become active; with 50% profit, capital will take risks; for 100% profit, capital dares to trample all human laws; with over 300% profit, capital dares to commit any crime, even risking hanging.” The frequent and widespread phenomenon of slavery and forced labor in China makes these civilian human traffickers almost expose several cases every week or even daily, with many more unknown. This new form of slavery is so rampant because, in capitalist China, the slave trade still yields extremely high profits—and capitalists do not even need to take many risks, as slave owners and middlemen collude closely. During the pandemic, all these slaves were vaccinated, tested, monitored by disease control, and registered with the government. However, the government of Zhongxiu tacitly approved their existence. In the video, the first slave’s workplace is right next to the local police station! Under the collusion of the Zhongxiu government and slave owners, these slaves might have tried to escape or report, but the final result was almost certainly being caught and beaten again.
Are such incidents rare? Not at all. As early as the 2007 Black Brick Kiln case, the true owner of the kiln was the local village committee secretary, so the foremen there could kill at will without worry. Later, many of the Black Brick Kiln cases exposed by Shangguan Zhengyi were almost semi-public, yet no one dared to escape or seek help. People who saw the brick factory’s situation often dared not report. In Shennongjia, if these slave owners did not have the tacit approval of bureaucrats and police, how could they keep these “disabled” people, who are not even very low in intelligence, detained for so long? How could they still maintain their slave status even when nucleic acid testing was widespread among them? The Zhongxiu government claims that their surveillance makes the people safer and that missing persons can be quickly found. But daily evidence from places like Shennongjia proves that the surveillance machinery in Zhongxiu is entirely used for suppressing and exploiting the people. They can monitor everyone, but when they see these slaves, they only use the opportunity to test, vaccinate, and provide orders to pharmaceutical companies, without any intention of rescuing them. As a reward for tacit approval (or perhaps even participation in capturing escapees), slave owners may bribe the police.
Therefore, although these issues urgently need exposure—so that the public can see the darkness of Zhongxiu and support these disabled people to regain freedom—mere exposure is far from enough. Shangguan Zhengyi has uncovered many cases of trafficking and slavery, but it cannot eradicate such phenomena. Zhongxiu even tacitly allows such people to exist and has given him the title of “China Good Person” in 2010. Because he only exposes these dark phenomena and the collusion between certain bureaucrats and slave owners, and at the same time praises larger police and government agencies for their “effective” handling of trafficking cases. This serves to gloss over the Zhongxiu government, acting as a “little scolding, big help.” More importantly, Zhongxiu’s narrative that disabled people are “out of central protection” and trapped in slavery can be used to praise their seemingly “more civilized” but equally brutal and larger-scale exploitation—making disabled people grateful for what they see as “better” exploitation. The so-called “national conscience” of China, Bai Xiang, profits immensely by employing disabled workers. Bai Xiang nominally claims equal pay for disabled and able-bodied workers, but disabled workers must produce the same output, which is far more exhausting and damaging to their health. This equal pay fundamentally cannot compensate for the extra labor needed by disabled workers, and the capitalists of Bai Xiang do not suffer any loss by employing disabled workers. However, because disabled people are considered “inferior labor” in capitalist society, they find it very hard to get jobs. Bai Xiang’s capitalists can threaten with unemployment, forcing disabled people to accept extremely low wages (nominally 2500, but often lower due to fines). Moreover, Bai Xiang employs many disabled workers to evade taxes, gaining huge profits. These predatory capitalists are thus portrayed as saviors of disabled people! If we oppose blatant slavery but do not oppose the more covert and glamorous capitalist slavery, even if disabled people are liberated, they will inevitably fall into a new hell of the same dignityless, dark, and abusive conditions. Furthermore, illegal forms of slavery like human trafficking are a supplement to the legal capitalist slavery system—special cases where, because disabled people’s mobility is limited and they find it difficult to fight for their rights, they are forcibly kept in extremely low-wage jobs. Some will use this to push disabled people into more extreme slavery, creating even more disabled individuals, and naturally, more Zhongxiu bureaucrats and police will become their protectors. The incidents at Black Brick Kiln and Shennongjia will keep happening over and over!