[This article provides the most detailed account to date of all aspects of my asylum seeking case]
Key words: limited capacity for civil conduct, involuntary hospitalisation, involuntary confinement, psychiatric admission, adult guardianship, the first-tier guardian, non-existent” mental illness “, guilt by association
Who should be diagnosed as a Persecutory Type Paranoid? China, The Communist Party, or me !
It’s not rare to hear international mainstream media outlets reporting worrying gay situations in China. As a LGBTQ member, I’m sharing my first hand knowledge about dilemmas of living in China. Please browse the websites below to put yourself in my shoes, be aware of wrong logics to analyse gay situations in China: LGBTQ – Safer than Iran!
- The Lancet September/2019: Discrimination against LGBT populations in China
- The Diplomat 13/August/2020: The Misuse of China’s Mental Hospitals – Feng Xiaoyan’s case shows how practices of involuntary hospitalisation and adult guardianship can combine to lock away unfortunate victims-sometimes for life
- The Economist 25/May/2023: Why the Communist Party fears gay rights – Social conservatism plus paranoia about foreign infiltration prompts a crackdown
- The Guardian 15/Jan/2024: ‘It’s difficult to survive’: China’s LGBTQ+ advocates face jail and forced confession
From a mental health perspective, in 2000, the Chinese Classification of Mental Disorders 3 (CCMD-3) removed homosexuality and bisexuality from the mental disorders categories. However, a considerable number of mental health professionals in China still consider homosexuality a disorder that should be treatable by sexual orientation conversion efforts (SOCE). At present, SOCE is provided by hospitals across China, including several leading medical centres in major Chinese cities.
China has no common law. Instead, China has mainly a civil law system. The law means statutes and excludes case law. In other words, court cases are not law, only rules codified by the legislature, the executive, and the judiciary are laws!
The reality of my case is: Gay- Enforced psychiatric committal – Electric Shocks – Adult Guardianship – Trumped-up charges from authorities. In China and the Party’s bleak logic, the acronyms LGBTQ are somewhat paranoia related.
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Mother was only a nominal sender with limited comprehension of legal terms, the incarceration was conducted by…
What happened: In 2012, when I was 20. I faced bullying at xx university due to my gay identity leading me to leave my English language studies. Since then, I’ve embraced independence, engaging in activities like intermittent Spanish language study and volunteering at various hostels in different cities. Being an adult, I felt it was appropriate to chart my own path in life.
“In 2014, shortly before my hospitalisation at Beijing Anding Hospital, I spent a few months in Yanji, a city in northeast China. I booked a flight from Yanji to Beijing, a city near my birthplace, Puyang in Henan province, and asked my mother to meet me at the Beijing airport. In her perception, Beijing was still quite distant from Puyang.
Anticipating isolation from my mother and relatives, I had hoped to discuss the school bullying I faced as a feminine guy, intending to explain my reasons for dropping out. However, my mother unexpectedly brought her third husband, Jia Jianjun, whom I had only met once, to the airport. His presence and comments about my manner of speaking, which he likened to that of a little girl, upset me.
The tension escalated on an airport shuttle bus. I attempted to avoid sharing the bus with Jia Jianjun, but he persisted in following me, given his relationship with my mother and residence at her apartment. When I insisted on getting off the bus, the driver initially ignored me, leading me to loudly demand to be let off.
Eventually, my mother, Jia Jianjun, and other passengers, including myself, disembarked. Jia Jianjun refused to let me separate from them, and in the ensuing confusion, someone called an ambulance from Beijing Anding Hospital.
Around midnight, Jia Jianjun forced me to go to the hospital’s emergency unit, where I sensed hostility from the staff. I managed to escape from the hospital grounds but was pursued by Jia Jianjun. After I hailed a taxi, he stopped it, falsely accusing me of drug use and forcibly taking me back to the hospital.
However, a considerable number of mental health professionals in China still consider homosexuality a disorder that should be treatable by sexual orientation conversion efforts (SOCE).
At Beijing Anding Hospital, I was labeled as a ‘paranoid schizophrenic,’ a persecutory type, by the police psychiatrist, Fan Meng. This label has had significant consequences, including the denial of a health certificate, which restricts my formal employment opportunities, relegating me to temporary jobs without health benefits.
In practice, psychiatrists appoint a sender randomly in the presence of your immediate relatives, they would ignore victims’ opinions.
The hospitalisation, which occurred between July and August 2014, around 1 to 4 am, was enforced. Despite my objections, Jia Jianjun and Fan Meng, from the hospital’s Judicial Appraisal Unit, were listed as the senders. The institution likely recorded the commitment as voluntary due to my mother’s presence.
During my stay, Jia Jianjun physically restrained me, and I was sedated against my will. It’s alleged that police were also involved during my unconsciousness. This experience reflects a broader issue in China, where involuntary commitment in psychiatric institutions often occurs without adequate legal safeguards, as noted by the Chinese NGO CRLW in its 2017 report on mental health and human rights.”
Police psychiatrist: Fan Meng ( 范萌, Female)
If there is only 1 person named Fan Meng, her Practicing Licence Number should be the one above.
Notes: Involuntary commitment in psychiatric institutions is a form of administrative and extra-judicial detention. Chinese NGO CRLW stated in its 2017 annual research report on mental health and human rights that it is still very easy to involuntarily commit a healthy individual to a psychiatric hospital, and that the mechanisms for filing complaints, appeals, and lawsuits are inadequate.
The Chinese medical authorities’ initial diagnosis included imbecility
“ Conversion Therapy ” was conducted under the guise of a “ serious ” mental disability ( like Paranoid Schizophrenia, Persecutory Type ) based solely on the opinion of psychiatrists, then they can be forcibly committed.
Like my case, diagnosis from Beijing Anding Hospital: The final version of the changed diagnosis was Paranoid ( persecutory type ) Schizophrenia, Intermittent Schizophrenia. My diagnosis ( in a handwritten form) had been changed several times by Chinese medical authorities: Aphrenia- (medicine) Stoppage of thought; inability to think, imbecility with a strikethrough marker on each word. The medical authorities’ initial diagnosis included Aphrenia ( stoppage of thought ), imbecility.
Notes: The Mental Health Law (MHL) stipulates that forced psychiatric commitment is based on a qualified physician diagnosing someone with a “serious mental disorder” and assessing that they have caused harm to, or are at risk of harming, themselves or others.
MHL calls for a “voluntary” principle and, at the very least, approval from the individuals’ guardians. ( In practice, if there’s presence of your immediate relatives, psychiatrists would ignore victims’ opinions. ) In criminal cases, the Criminal Procedure Law (CPL) only permits a court to approve an involuntary commitment on the recommendation of a procuratorate, and it does not allow government officials or public security police to act unilaterally to institutionalise anyone.
Beijing Anding Hospital imposed a very regimented routine on our patients. Nurses watched me like a hawk.
A litany of abuses I suffered during the hospitalisation:
1. I suffered a tilted neck from unidentifiable drugs ( I lost consciousness for several days ) and electric shocks, my chest and spine were twisted.
2. 29 days of intensive meditation, they treated me like an experimental object and it was all a disguised form of physical torture.
3. Headaches, a burning spine, muscle contractions and spasms, my thinking became sluggish and my movements stiffened. I was left trembling and sweating all over.
4. Food deprivation 1 day.
5. I was ignored and left in my waste. The first week I urinated and defecated in the pants uncontrollably.
6. Both of my forearms were tied to handrails every time after I woke up from electric shocks in the first two weeks of the hospitalisation.
7. My hair stood up after electric shocks, nurses and inmates laughed at me.
8. Slaps from a guy ( A hospital hired barber) who shaved my hair, although I never met him before.
9. My mother clenched her teeth and used her fist to initiate a beat to me when I was suffering muscle contractions in the process of an MRI examination in Beijing Anding Hospital, because of my uncontrollable spasms and extrapyramidal symptoms.
10. My positions of extrapyramidal symptoms were teased and mocked by nurses and inmates.
11. I was spat on by Fan Meng ( the police psychiatrist ) for no reason.
After I was deemed ready for release and allowed to return to Puyang city, my electronic devices and medical documents from Beijing Anding Hospital were confiscated by my mother. I was watched by Jia Jianjun 24 hours during the first week of the release when my mother was not at home.
I was forced to sign an “ Abandonment Agreement ” after the discharge, living in fear of social deprivation
The side effects of electric shocks, Chlorpromazine and Haloperidol made me unable to keep the balance of movements. After the psychiatric incarceration in 2014, maybe in October or November, my mom forced me to sign an abandonment agreement at her apartment.
She initiated this written agreement with the words “ Are you clear minded? After you receive this xxx RMB ( Chinese Currency ), I won’t give you any financial assistance any more in the rest of your life. ” The first two years ( 2014, 2015) after the discharge was the hardest to survive.
My mother accompanied me to Bank of Puyang to deposit xxx RMB via a debit card to evade collective punishment based purely on family ties, gay identity, duty of being a legal guardian and stigma attached to “having a schizophrenic son”.) Half a year later, Extrapyramidal symptoms were gone, I was looking for rehabilitation treatments for spine, chest, muscle contractions, spasms…
I went to several provinces with the xxx RMB my mother gave me to look for a temporary place to stay.
At that moment I was still in pain, the onset of extrapyramidal symptoms was the scariest, everyone would freak out when my tongue stuck out and the eyes were rolled upwards uncontrollably.
I was seeking evidence to prove my clean past
Noncriminal certificate issued by Puyang City Public security bureau xx Branch on 17, November, 2014.
9 years uncommon whole spinal repair due to electric shock injuries
So far my health conditions:
1. Toxins of the enforced drugs and Extrapyramidal symptoms were eliminated in 2015.
2. During 2015-2023, the shape of my neck, shoulder and spine was repaired. Multiple times large scale Neck+Shoulder+Spine Acupotomy. (A minimally invasive surgery).
The problem lies with a loophole in the Mental Health Law involving “ guardianship ” of adults who are considered highly influenced by a hostile West in ideologically authoritarian China
In 2014 I was institutionalised involuntarily, and was subjected to electric shock treatment and drug injections ( allegedly Chlorpromazine, confirmation: Sedatives, Haloperidol ) at Beijing Anding Hospital.
Once a false diagnosis is associated with a “ serious mental disability ” , generally the victims will be deprived of full capacity for civil conduct.
In China, Domestic Law may authorise a court or other competent authority, acting on the basis of competent and independent medical advice, to order that such persons be admitted to a mental health facility.
Notes: In 2012, the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) raised concern that involuntary confinement is used as a tool to maintain public security, and was “disturbed” that individuals with “actual or perceived impairments” had been subjected to such detentions, which violates the Convention in regard to liberty and security of persons, and freedom from torture (Articles 14 and 15). CRPD recommended the government abolish all forms of involuntary civil commitment based on actual or perceived impairments and cease subjecting such individuals to therapies, but Chinese authorities have ignored these recommendations.
The problem lies with a loophole in the Mental Health Law involving “ guardianship ” of vulnerable adults, powers often assumed by relatives or officials without the patient’s consent. The person concerned has no right to appeal the decision to confer guardianship status. Once a person had been appointed guardian, they were expected to take on the task of representing the vulnerable adult legally, causing a conflict of interest.
X-Ray images and MRI images:
1. 29/03/2016 X-Ray images of a tilted neck
2. 25/06/2016 MRI images of a tilted neck
3. 17/01/2017 MRI images of a twisted spine
4. 06/02/2017 X-Ray images of neck and a twisted chest
5. 10/10/2018 X-Ray images of neck and a twisted chest
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Deprived civil conduct by Chinese judicial organs: Adult victims were labelled to be a “ Mama’s Boy ” in the name of limited/no capacity for civil conduct
Mama’s Boy: An insulting word for a boy or man who depends too much on his mother and is considered weak!
The policewoman named He Tao whose duty was for Registration of Household Migration made an oversight without a thorough check about my documents ( My limited capacity of civil conduct status ) used for immigrating to Yuanjian Village ( Where I bought my apartment in Chongqing). Allegedly, in 2019 He Tao was disciplined and fired due to this negligence!
Since 23/Sep/2023, I was in difficulties of getting a crime report after the experience of being a victim of robbery and violence in Zvornik, BiH
{27/Aug/2023-22/Sep/2023} Serbia.
{22/Sep/2023-23/Sep/2023} BiH. Terrifying 04:55am in Bosnia, from an insincere “ invitation ” to horror: Surviving Violence and Robbery.
{23/Sep/2023-10/Oct/2023} Serbia. I sought help about getting a crime report after the experience of being a victim of robbery and violence in Zvornik, BiH on 23/09/2023.
I also consulted someone from one organisation in Serbia about the right steps for the asylum process in Serbia. For example, the time limitation for an asylum intention letter… But I didn’t start the process at that moment, because “asylum” was still an alien word to me. In China, very few people know Human Rights.
{11/Oct/2023 -19/Dec/2023} China. Acupotomy surgeries (A minimally invasive surgery).
{19/Dec/2023 -24/Dec/2023} Thailand. A stopover.
{25/Dec/2023} Istanbul. A stopover.
{25/Dec/2023- Now} Serbia. Asylum seeking journey.
Will I be a target of Exit Ban by Chinese authorities since my full capacity for civil conduct was limited? Performance indicators system of public security bureau will answer this question
If you are a supporter of coercive adult guardianship based on enforced psychiatric treatment ( For example, gay conversion therapy…), you will never feel the repercussions of a fixed guardianship appointment system.
Deprivation of freedom is based on vaguely worded “ national security ” grounds
The Exit-Entry Administration Law (EEAL) not only authorizes exit bans based on vaguely worded “national security” grounds, but also adds a clause (Article 12) that effectively means anyone can be barred from leaving for any reason.
Exit bans can be imposed on persons who “may endanger national security or interests, and are not allowed to exit China upon decision by competent departments under the State Council” (effectively any government office) or under the sweeping “other circumstances in which exit from China is not allowed in accordance with laws or administrative regulations”.
The Supervision Law (SL)(Article 30) authorizes the use of exit bans on “persons connected to the person under investigation”. Here “connected to” (相关) is a broad enough term to be interpreted as widely as the Supervision Commissions wish—anyone from work colleagues, family members to friends and beyond.
In China, once you are on an internal/public missing persons list, your identity would be similar to vagrants or beggars
If a policeman really cares about a missing person’s safety, they shouldn’t yell at you from the beginning to the end during a so-called “ inquiry-purposed ” arrest, especially when you never met them in the past!
Creepy Moments of the Arrest Conducted by A Plainclothes Vice Chief Police at 16:16 04/Dec/2023
Plainclothes vice chief Rao Yuanchen ( From Zhujiaba Police Station) and 2 auxiliary policemen were hiding in a patrolling car. When I was arrested arbitrarily by a vice chief of Zhujiaba Police Station on the way to my apartment from an adjacent neighborhood named Yanjia, the vice chief ( Rao Yuanchen kept yelling at me “You are on a missing persons list! ” Although I never met Rao Yuanchen and the two auxiliary policemen before.
Accumulated fears I have about returning to China
- Continuing Electric Shocks, Forced mental drugs intake ( Due to the history of the prescription of Chlorpromazine and Haloperidol) at any medical facility directly administered and run by the Ministry of Public Security and its subordinate provincial-level departments. It’s not an one-off incident, anyone has risks to be incarcerated at any medical facility again once you have a psychiatric committal history.
- Misdiagnosis ( associated with legally deprived civil conduct ) won’t be erased in the police and medical authorities’ registration system, because the police psychiatrist belongs to the judicial appraisal unit and my 29 days ( purportedly it’s 29 days, because my mom confiscated my original medical documents, and I got no copies) incarceration occured at Beijing Anding Hospital ( It’s a public security bureau affiliated specialized psychiatric hospital) , I was supposed to be incarcerated for 30 days.
- A fixed sequence of a guardian appointment according to the current general provisions of the civil law. The coercive family planning.
Notes: According to the professional legal-medical literature from China, there’s a close and longstanding cooperation between forensic psychiatrists and the security authorities in effecting the simultaneous criminalisation and medicalization of certain forms of dissenting activity, various diagnostic theories and perspectives that are commonly applied in such cases. As claimed by the authorities, have been mentally disordered to any significant degree.
Guilt by association- an added means of control on top of law enforcement
China’s modern-day collective punishment creates an “atmosphere of fear so that even just the threat of family members suffering is enough to act as a deterrent. This is an informal and wholly illegal system where family and friends of those who are suspected or found guilty of a “crime” are also punished based purely on relationship ties.
Loved ones of human rights defenders are commonly targets, but anyone can be a victim. When a rights defender is detained or imprisoned, collective punishment or the threat of collective punishment is likely aimed at getting them to confess or discourage advocacy by family members on their behalf.
Non-mainstream LGBTQ community, certain types of dissidents, whom the government regards as posing an ideological threat to “ social order. ”
Today, threats or punishments levelled at loved ones are proving to be an effective measure to crush dissent, coerce confessions and scare people into silence.
The Chinese government has banned all depictions of gay related content, as part of a cultural crackdown on “ vulgar, immoral and unhealthy content ”
The judicial and legislative framework governing the practice of forensic psychiatry in China: The criminal and civil law contexts, legislation on mental health and forensic-psychiatric assessment. Also considered is the question of China’s expansive definition of the key legal determinant of involuntary psychiatric committal, namely “ social dangerousness. ”
Whereas under international standards, the applicable scope of the “ dangerousness ” criterion is mainly restricted to situations where mentally ill people pose a direct physical danger either to themselves or to others, in China it’s applied also to those, such as non-mainstream LGBTQ, certain types of dissidents, whom the government regards as posing an ideological threat to “ social order. ”
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This confession was hard to read because I couldn’t imagine such level of dystopia exists nowadays. At least this hardship turned you into a strong person you are now .
I couldn’t imagine my own family members aiding in such atrocities. Thank you for sharing your experiences and raising this issue. I hope you will be granted asylum somewhere else and are safe. Your documentation should definitely help your case.
Although Serbia isn’t a popular destination for asylum seekers, especially LGBTQ members, there’s a an asylum law. Mainstream persecution claims from China are about torture, politics, forced psychiatric committal… In Europe,it might be rare to hear these sufferings, because Europeans are over optimistic about China’s economic growth.
In China, enforced psychiatric committal is combined with adult guardianship, judicial appraisal unit appoints a legal guardian to you with a fixed guardianship planning according to the current civil law in China, victims can’t make their own decisions. I’m against the life-long civil commitment.
How can we help to provide support for people like? I know LGBT+ person from countries how persecute LGBTQ+ community can have a refugee visa and start a new life.
Personally, LGBTQ organisations mainly provide protection services in their own country, they aren’t familiar with foreign countries’ legal system. What we can do now is to establish a grassroots rights defenders community to share our experiences and offer good ideas for practical protection.