A young Chinese girl experienced the wrath of her "grandmother from hell" when she asked the old woman to buy her a pen. Instead of giving in to the request, the mean old lady repeatedly kicked the child.
An onlooker filmed the assault on the tyke and posted it on Weibo, China's equivalent of Twitter. The post became viral, reports Daily Mail. The shrieks of the poor child could be heard during the three-minute video which had been viewed by thousands of Weibo users.
The video-taker tried to intervene and asked the grandmother what she was doing. The woman even shot back, "This is nothing. I use a stick at home." She even justified her action, saying, "If you don't hit her, she will go crazy."
Besides kicking her granddaughter, the woman also took the girl's hat and used it to beat the tyke. While the kid was sobbing the word "pen," her grandmother shouted, "Why are you asking for money? Do you still want the pen?"
She only stopped the beating when cops arrived. Although the video does not indicate where in China it happened, the number of people passing and the exteriors indicate it could have taken place in a train station or mall. But it was also noticeable that no one among the passersby bothered to intervene, which prompted some Weibo users to comment on the apathy.
One user wrote, "I would have gone up directly to say something to her." Another chided the old woman, saying she is sick and is so heartless.
In YouTube, where the video was reposted, Mansour points out that because of China's one-child policy, the little girl kicked is not only the woman's granddaughter, but her only granddaughter.
Some parents (and grandparents) justify corporal punishment on their children as necessary to instill discipline. But in the case of American couple Gregory and Melanie Magazu who applied to become foster parents in 2012, a Massachusetts court denied their application after admitting they spank their two daughters on the buttocks with their hands, reports Parentherald.
A 2014 report says that 60 percent of Chinese kids suffer from corporal punishments, and most of the victims are girls like the one in the video. Besides spanking, other forms of punishment experienced, according to the China Legal Studies Association, include being scolded, forced to kneel, tied up and thrown out of the house.
Experts blame the phenomenon to children being considered property of parents and not as individuals. They push for a ban on corporal punishment.