‘Human Rights Are Won Through Struggle:’ Student Protests Erupt in Sichuan and Shanxi

According to videos and social media posts published by China-focused protest-monitoring account YesterdayBigcat, students at Anyue Middle School in Ziyang, Sichuan, staged a collective protest on the evening of Sept. 23 after being granted only one day off for the Mid-Autumn Festival.

The account reported that large numbers of students gathered in the dormitory area and shouted from building to building to express their dissatisfaction. Some reportedly planned to smash the school cafeteria the following day, while a student representative left the campus and delivered a speech in the street that drew cheers from the crowd. School officials subsequently restored the Mid-Autumn Festival break to three days.

On Sept. 24, students at Kangjie Middle School in Yuncheng, Shanxi, reportedly staged a separate protest against the principal’s strict management style, posting slogans around campus including “Struggle Brings Human Rights.”

Subsequently, students from Anyue Middle School posted joyfully on social media, stating that a student named Tang Jiechuan had led his classmates in the protest despite the pressure and had ultimately succeeded. One user commented: “If it weren’t for him, Anyue Middle School would’ve only had the Mid-Autumn Festival day off. Now that the uprising has succeeded, the school has changed it to a three-day break.” This will go down in Anyue Middle School’s history—previous minor uprisings never succeeded.”

On Sept. 24, a student protest also took place at Kangjie Middle School in Yuncheng, Shanxi. Unsatisfied with Principal Yan Zongmin’s strict management style, students posted protest slogans throughout the campus, such as “Yan Zongmin Oppresses Students” and “Fight for Human Rights,” to express their grievances.

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Netizens expressed support and praise for the protesting students. “These students are very brave. They’ve torn down the suffocating walls of the campus with their purest rage! It’s so hard to defend your rights from within those walls!” “Haha! This is exactly how you should exercise the fundamental rights granted by the Constitution!” “This is the kind of spirit this generation should have—they’re so tough!” “Go, warriors!” 

Recently, collective protests have taken place on school campuses in many parts of China in response to high-pressure control measures in mainland schools.

Videos circulating online show that, on the evening of May 29, students at Yangxin County Experimental High School in Hubei Province protested against the school’s high-pressure control measures. The students sang the song “Flower of Freedom” in unison from the windows of the classroom building, and many wrote heartfelt messages on pieces of paper and tossed them down from the building. The lawn was littered with paper, resembling a snow-covered landscape. One photo shows a piece of paper bearing the six large characters: “Give me liberty or give me death.”

Another video shows that, from the evening of May 26 to the early morning of May 27, large groups of students at Guangxi Sports College and Guilin Aerospace Industry College sang together all night to express their dissatisfaction with prolonged power outages and sweltering heat in their dormitories. That night, temperatures at both locations were around 30°C (86°F).

The students sang the song “Glorious Years” in unison. Its lyrics include lines such as “Hold tight to freedom amid wind and rain” and “We are confident we can change the future.”

On May 16, more than 2,000 students at Wenshang County No. 1 High School in Jining, Shandong, staged a protest. Some students posted on social media that, on the afternoon of May 15, the school administration had issued a notice stating that classes would not end until 5:50 p.m. the following day (compared to the usual 3:50 p.m.), a change that all the students opposed. The following morning, the students carried out their “uprising” according to a plan they had agreed upon the previous evening.

At around 9:50 a.m., students on the third floor of the academic building were the first to take action. They stormed out of their classrooms together, chanting for a “day off,” and marched to the school plaza to assemble. Their actions were quickly echoed by first- and second-year high school students, and over 2,000 students joined the protest.

During the protest, a student held aloft a banner—previously used in a historical play—bearing the words “Fight for sovereignty abroad; eliminate traitors at home,” sparking a collective cheer. At the same time, an article titled “Manifesto Against Wenshang No. 1 High School” began circulating among the students. It read: “Tens of thousands of students, united in indignation, must remain true to our convictions, argue our case on the merits, and absolutely refuse to submit to groundless and oppressive restrictions!”