In the early hours of June 10, a group of men launched a brutal attack on several women having dinner at a barbecue restaurant in Tangshan, Hebei province. The incident provoked public uproar after surveillance footage of the incident spread online, which showed one of the women rejecting sexual advances from the man, who reacted by beating her, and was soon joined by eight other men in his group in an all-out attack on her and three other women who intervened.

This brutal assault inspired many discussions about the extent of gender-based violence and sexual harassment in Chinese society, though others linked the attack to organized crime and thuggery. Several high-profile cases involving rape, domestic abuse, and human trafficking in recent years have highlighted growing public awareness of the role of gender in violence and crime. China has strengthened laws on sexual assault, domestic abuse, and gender-based violence in recent years: It implemented a law against domestic violence in 2016, and updated its Civil Code in 2021, defining “sexual harassment” in law for the first time.

Nevertheless, there is still stigma attached to reporting these issues to relevant authorities. In a UN study from 2013 on “Gender Violence and Masculinity in China,” around half of both men and women surveyed did not know there were laws in China against violence against women, while 25 percent of men and 23 percent of women felt the existing laws were too harsh for the perpetrator.

The following infographics show milestone incidents from the last two years that stirred public discussions on gender-based violence, as well as relevant statistics and government responses to these incidents:

Contributions from Siyi Chu (褚司怡), Hatty Liu, Alex Colville, Yang Tingting (杨婷婷), and Anita He (贺文文)