#303: Parents Paid For Their Teens To Be Kidnapped From Bed & Taken To Elite Torture Academy

26:40I mean, it was really bad. They typically hit students on the butt with this because anywhere else, I mean, it could potentially be fatal or break a bone. It was that dangerous. And even the bottom, a lot of the students after being hit, they could not walk. They could not lay down for weeks. They couldn't even sit down. Their whole butt looked like it was painted in these deep purple colors. When the dragon cane came out, all the other students, they instinctively wanted to cover their ears. because whoever gets hit with that cane, it said they release such primal screams, it's too much to listen to.

27:17It's visceral. And then worse than the dragon cane, probably the worst, is some of the students were sexually harassed or assaulted at the hands of the teachers. One teacher would force Young to sleep in the same bed as them and caressed his thighs. Reportedly, he never went further than that, but Young remembered how traumatized he was, how scared he was when the teacher would whisper in his ear, I will track you down if you ever get out of here. And Young's situation was bad, but it wasn't even the worst. It speculated because a lot of the social stigma, a lot of the essay or the harassment didn't even come out.

27:53But we do know that there was a 20-year-old girl that was stuck in this academy and the instructors would rip out her hair as punishment and stick pens into her private areas. it just was a never-ending cycle of okay classes being on the edge of saying the wrong thing being breathing the wrong way getting beaten getting beaten anyway even if you did nothing wrong then going back to your dorms and facing harassment only to start the miserable cycle again but sometimes the teachers would have you skip class altogether and just participate in hard labor at one point the academy is getting so popular amongst parents that they're outgrowing their current building.

28:32So instead of hiring a legitimate construction company, the students were forced to move bricks by stairs from like the first floor to the fifth floor all day, seven days a week. If they didn't do it fast enough, they would get beat. Young, who was on brick duty, he said there were so many times he wished someone would just drop a stack of bricks on his head and kill him. Yeah. And the irony was not lost on any of them. They're not getting paid to do this hard labor. They were getting punished while they're doing it. And not only that, but their parents were paying the academy for them to be living like this.

29:10Young said, our parents paid them. They didn't even treat us like human beings. This boarding school does kind of remind me of the Stanford prison experiment in the sense that the mind games are so strong. So technically, the red cloaks, the students, the captives, they outnumber the adults. They could easily try and overpower them. A lot of them have better stamina. They're teenagers, right? They've got more energy. But because of how deprived they are and how broken they were from the silent room, these kids became enforcers of the rules. Now it's not just the white cloaks looking to see if some of the students messed up.

29:47The students started ratting each other out. All for what? For a piece of sugar, not even a piece of candy, like a little piece of cane sugar. Hmm. These students barely got enough food and not just taste wise, but these students were heavily malnourished. I mean, they were fed disgusting molding food at the time. The students mainly ate scrambled eggs, but it was as if someone wanted to put as little egg as possible, like they're leaving half the egg liquid out to save and then throwing in the whole eggshell. They said the scrambled eggs were just 90 % eggshell. Rotten vegetables would be turned into rotten soups, and the headmaster specifically told them, we make you eat this food to train you to be better.

30:31One time a student picked up his chopsticks, pulled something out of his soup. It was an old washcloth cooked into the veggie soup. A piece of tablecloth. Yeah. It was common for students to have ulcers in and around their mouth, which is caused by insufficient intake of certain vitamins and minerals. Like these kids, they have no reason to keep going. They had no reason to want to stick around. This piece of sugar was their reason. This became the, forget about getting out of here. Forget about family, life and friends before all of this. No, this piece of sugar was heaven. Which later would be very traumatic.

31:10A lot of the victims said they lost so much self-dignity. They lost what it meant to be a human in here. Once they got out, they were so shocked at how low they were willing to go for a piece of sugar. Sometimes they would rat out another student, hear them get completely beaten in the room right next door, or sometimes it would happen right in front of them. They would be hit with the metal stick or sometimes the dragon cane, and the student would be crying out in pain, but they didn't even care. They would be smiling, staring at the piece of sugar in their hand, debating, Should I eat it now or save it for later?

31:48It's like Lord of the Rings, my precious. But there would be little moments of hope. The most recent one was a nine-year-old girl that got out of the silent room. And clearly, it did not break her. She was rebelling, non-stop screaming at teachers, refusing to back down. At one point, she was pinned down by multiple adults and personally beaten by the headmaster of the academy. She was beaten about 30 times in the span of like a week. She still refused to back down. Wow. And the students in the red cloaks, they all glanced at each other because, I mean, this is one of the youngest. Is this the moment?

32:23Is this our rebellion? Do we back up this little nine-year-old girl? In front of the whole academy, she was dragged out to the big Confucius statue in the courtyard. Yeah, the academy was obsessed with Confucius. Kneel. No. The nine-year-old girl is like, no, I'm not going to kneel. Kneel and ask for forgiveness. No. The teachers are now looking at the students because for a split second they see it. The other kids, they had pride, hope, excitement in their eyes. And the headmaster saw it too. He knew that a single grain of hope would end his whole career. It could bring down the whole academy.

33:04They could rebel. They could all take a side against him. So he brought the dragon cane and beat the back of the nine-year-old girl's knees till she was forcibly kneeling. And slowly the other kids' shoulders, they all started to slump and their very brief symbol of hope was gone. In the end, she would kneel in front of that Confucius statue all day until she passed out from a heat stroke. Some of the kids decided that day that there was no way of escaping. None of the stories of escape from the academy ended well and these students realized that these successful prison escapes, they only happen in TV shows.

33:45Young decided his only way to try was grab the bottle of laundry detergent left in the laundry room and chug the remainder of it. There was only half a bottle of liquid left, but he hoped maybe it'll do the job. Within the hour, he felt like there was lava running through his stomach, running through his brain. It felt like his skull was about to explode. The teachers noticed. They rushed him to the local hospital and the doctor said, we have to pump his stomach and the only option to do that is you got to sign these permission forms because he's a minor and we're about to pump his stomach. We can't just do that.

34:18The teacher sat back and said, actually, we'd like to take him back then. We don't want to sign anything. Wow, so they don't want their signature. Oh my gosh. They don't want any proof that this happened. The teachers bring him back to the academy without helping him at all in this hospital and thought the laundry detergent was not a corrosive chemical. So it's not like he drank a cup of acid and it's eating up his insides and they need to counteract that acid. It's a toxic poison, yeah, but they just need to get it out of his system. Pumping the stomach, that's like throwing up, right? How hard is it to pump someone's stomach at home?

34:56Have you heard of the water cure? It's a misleading name. It sounds like it's going to cure you and make you feel better, but it dates back to the 15th century and it's a form of torture. Americans actually used this in war before. The American army, the military. It's an old school waterboarding. They stick a homemade hose into the sink faucet, shove a funnel into your mouth and force you to drink copious amounts of water until your stomach is so bloated like a balloon, too distended and the natural reflex would be to constantly vomit. It's like something you cannot control. Yeah, or you could drown, right?

35:32You could die, yeah. You could get water intoxication. You could drown from the water. The water could go down wrong. They strapped him down on a table to make sure he could not drink the water. They repeated this process over and over. So it wasn't a one-time thing where it's like, okay, now you threw it out. They didn't know how much was left in there of the laundry detergent. So they forced him to vomit all night long. He was exhausted from vomiting. He was sweating. It was the worst night of his life, but it would stay with him forever. Not even just the memory. Since then, Young hasn't been able to eat well.

36:08He often gets sick and throws up his food. And for a full year, blood and foam would also come out every time that he threw up. He lost a severe worrying amount of weight. He suffered from debilitating gastric reflux. So laundry detergent can be very dangerous inside the body. It has the potential to cause holes in the esophagus and sometimes even in the stomach. And if you know anything about laundry detergent, it's not easy to rub off. Another student swallowed half a tube of toothpaste since that's all she would get her hands on. She immediately started throwing up and feeling the burns in her stomach.

36:43Swallowing large amounts of regular toothpaste can cause possible intestinal blockage. And if the toothpaste is fluoride toothpaste, you might even experience convulsions. She was doubled over in the bathroom, throwing up when a teacher came over, not even in a rush. Someone had ratted her out. So he knew what she was trying to do. She was trying to end things. he walks over grabs the bottle of toothpaste casually reads the ingredients looks at her and says i read the ingredients it's not going to kill you and i'm not going to take you to the hospital because pain is a consequence of your actions you deserve it next time maybe don't try stupid things he left her to throw up all night long another student ripped apart plastic water bottles because again that's all he had that's all he thought could make a weapon and he used these rough, jagged, but very dull edges of the plastic to try and puncture his skin on his wrist area.

37:41Teachers found out and they hit him where he had already cut himself. They hit him with a metal ruler that had already hit copious amounts of people that was never cleaned, had dried blood on there. The mix of the plastic, metal, and blood and the unsanitary living conditions caused him to get an infection and his wrists were leaking pus for weeks and he still has those scars. The tuition paid by these parents was not cheap, especially not for national standards. It was around$10 ,000 a year. We don't know how much the headmaster of Yu Zhang was making, but another headmaster from another similar academy was making around$11 million for basically torturing kids.

38:30And the part that intrigued a lot of netizens, though, were if parents are paying this much, right, and they're able to visit the school, see the students, sometimes even interact with their own children. Why didn't the children tell them that this was all happening? I mean, surely the parents would be lining up and trying to beat up the abusers. They're not going to pay the abusers for traumatizing their own kids. When it was parent day, the whole school transformed into this beautiful Hogwarts style boarding school. Chefs were brought in to cook for the parents. and they said, oh, these are our chefs that were here all year round.

39:03Gone was the rotten cloth veggie soup. It was now replaced by healthy organic meals with tons of variety and the students would just stare at the food in disbelief. They did unspeakable things for a piece of sugar and now their parents are standing there tasting the food, telling their kids, nagging the kids, be more grateful. Other children would kill to eat like this on a daily basis. I don't even eat like this on a daily basis. they bit their tongues they never told their parents that this was all fake the kids were destroyed to the point where they were so scared to do anything they had been indoctrinated basically brainwashed that if they were to say something their parents would never believe them their life is only going to get harder inside this school even when parents demanded to talk to their kids on the phone to see how they're doing because they're not allowed phones they're not allowed much visiting hours, there would always be a teacher next to them holding a dragon cane.

39:58The student wouldn't have to tell their parents and lie, no, no, no, everything's great, better, better than great, actually. The students were told, if you ever get out and you say something, we can easily, easily tell your parents that we got to bring you back for mandatory recalibrating. That's what we'll call it. Just to make sure we're updating the system, You know, like a car that needs an oil change. Your mind needs reminders to be a good kid. So in front of the parents, most of the kids never said a peep. They already felt betrayed. I mean, their parents sent them here. What hope did they have that their parents would care if they told them what's going on?

40:34I mean, half the kids probably thought, my parents already know what's going on, I'm sure, because why would they send me here? The headmaster would constantly remind them just how easy it was for him to have control over them. Their parents had already signed the contracts and he could very easily convince them that the students needed to stay here because they're mentally unstable. It's pretty bad. Even in the US, we have involuntary commitment, which can be easily abused. It's this gray area where as long as you argue and can convince a judge or anyone really that the person in question is somehow a danger to themselves or others, you can take tiny little text messages of young people lingo of like, oh my gosh, I'm going to kill myself.

41:15That could be used against you and blown into this very serious thing of, oh no, you're a danger to yourself. We got to commit you. And it's probably even easier if you're a parent involuntary committing your child. The students knew this and they're living in this hell, so they didn't dare say anything to their parents when they visited or even when they were released back home. They kept quiet. Until October 26th, 2017, an expose went live on social media about the Yujang Academy, a well-known social media personality named Gentle. So he's known for writing articles about social issues and scandals.

41:55He worked with Young, so one of the former students I was telling you about, and they worked on this piece. Young's main agenda with this is he knew the academy was still up and running. He knew that they had about 100 students enrolled at a single time and he wanted to help these students. He wanted to get them out. Also, another big concern for Young and Gentle was that in 2017, school for online addiction was trending online. A bunch of parents were googling school for online addiction. And that is what Yuzhang Academy marketed themselves as. This was like, you know, in China, online addiction was such a big thing for parents they think kids are addicted to internet they think the kids are like you know they had they're addicts that's how they see it if any kids are playing video games or they're like just whatever in front of a computer especially like i think the last yeah 10 20 years when this whole thing happened yeah parents are going crazy they think they're the kids are ruining their life because of computer and internet this is the flip side of the solution that they came up with.

42:59It's insane. Yeah. I mean, I saw netizens comment like, parents think we're obsessed with the internet, but they're obsessed with Mahjong. Like, what's the difference? One's a screen? Yeah. So these academies, I mean, they had a target audience, apparently lots of parents. They marketed themselves as treatment centers to fix children who can't live without video games or can't follow the rules. They bought out ads on different platforms to try and convince parents to send their kids there. They spent over$100 ,000. Yujang Academy spent over$100 ,000 to advertise their academy. And their message was in the ads, through national education methods, we will turn your poorly behaved kids into well-mannered, well-behaved, thoughtful children.

43:43And just to give you like a picture of what it usually looks like, it's like kids starting to play video games or they will spend their off times on the computer. And the parents were trying to talk to them like, Like, why aren't you studying? Why aren't you doing this? Why aren't you doing that? And the kids just want to escape that, right? So the parents think internet is the issue. A lot of time in these type of situations, it's the reflection of the family, the parenting, the surrounding. The parents are pushing the kids further and further and further. So the kids just completely want to block them out.

44:13And then these parents turn to these online addiction, quote, school to train their kids. It's like they don't want to put in the time to train their kids. They think this is the solution. Because whenever I'm hanging out with my family, like if I'm genuinely having a good time with my parents, I'm not going to be on my phone. So maybe you should bond with your children.

44:38And because the academy was so evil, the kids, they instantly changed. The first checkup for parents was around the 10-day mark. And usually they would be ecstatic to see that their child had done a 180. They were a whole new person. They would go home and talk to all their friends. Word of mouth was the most effective advertising for the academy, though. I would hope that some of these parents had no idea that they had just sent their kids to hell on earth. But it does seem like they were so blinded about having perfect children that they at least ignored a red flag or two. Gentle and Young thought more students would be enrolled since the trending topic list showed that parents are having troubles with their kids and this is what happens.

45:19So after their article was published, more former victims start coming forward about Yujang Academy and start sharing their stories. They said, we're all willing to get our stories fact-checked. We've got the proof. And if you need, we will go the legal route with you guys. Like if you guys want to do a class action something, let's do it. The day after the piece was posted, the police started an official investigation because of social media into the academy as well as its headmaster. Gentle, the account that broke the story, they had two main objectives. operation one is operation shutdown shut down the academy and save the current students their second one was a lot more complicated operation healing not many of the students got any real healing or treatment after all that physical mental and emotional torture because they didn't even tell their parents what had happened in there i mean they were broken still even just the trauma of betrayal these kids felt by their parents the ones that were supposed to look out for them.

46:15It was a mountain to get past. Most of the kids were kidnapped in the middle of the night like May. Just scary men waking them up in the middle of the night, dragging them out of their house. They saw their parents watching. They saw their parents open the door for these kidnappers. Other kids were tricked. Their parents said, we haven't been bonding recently. Let's go on a road trip. The kids would get so excited the night before they would giggle gaggle with their parents, pick out snacks, go to the grocery store, make a playlist for the ride. And then after a few hours and a long nap later, the kids would wake up in front of a creepy looking boarding school.

46:50Their parents would drag them out the car, kicking and screaming, get back into their car, just drive away. They wouldn't even look back. Almost always the kid tries to chase them down, but they didn't even have a chance. And when they finally turned around, there's a group of 10 men in white robes ready to catch them they would be dragged inside and thrown naked into the silent room a lot of victims lost all hope and faith in parents family members they i mean they had such a violation of trust after this they didn't even know how to get that back how to get past that and it wasn't even just toward the parents one victim shan shan she said she was screaming her head off after an incident of torture in the courtyard she apparently screamed so loud, someone outside the academy, someone that doesn't work with the academy, doesn't know the academy, heard her screams and called the police on the academy.

47:39Police show up and Shan Shan's thinking, okay, this is my chance. We're all going to be freed. I will be free. We'll all be free. She saw the police talking to the headmaster. The headmaster explained the situation that Shan Shan's mom had signed away guardianship rights and Shan Shan was actually now officially in the care of the academy. And in China, a bit of tough parenting isn't necessarily illegal. It's kind of more case-by-case situations. The police said that they understood. And they left without, first of all, freeing Shan Shan. But even so much as asking for her side of the story. These are police.

48:15Shan Shan thought, if my parents don't care, if the cops don't care, who the hell cares? She was thrown back into the silent room after that. so gentle and a team of volunteers they they wanted to help everyone get past things they decided to create a private whatsapp group for the survivors they made sure to vet each one of them to make sure that they weren't some other journalists trying to get in and get their own stories or sickos who just wanted to poke around and ask for pictures but real students who had been through the torture at yujang they were the only ones permitted in now side note one of the main reasons that gentle didn't want other journalists in the group was not because he's like, no, I'm the only journalist that can talk about this.

48:56But a lot of the students were debating whether or not they wanted to bring this case to court. So they actually used this group chat because they're all scattered around the country. That's why some of them were in the van for 36 hours. Some of them were in 10 hours, one hour, right? They use this as a way to share their testimonies and maybe even prep getting a lawsuit ready together. Gentle brought in volunteers to help organize the testimonies and timelines of when everything took place and any crucial pieces of evidence that they had. The group chat had 60 members and this was just a safe space to share everything and find some healing.

49:31A lot of what we know now about this case was actually thanks to the students in the group chat consenting to release many of the stories so the world could know about what was going on in the academy. It was a place of healing but also a legal strategy room, if you will. There were 60 members in that group chat, but only 59 were victims. One was a wolf in sheep's clothing. He got through the vetting process because he knew all the intimate details of the school. He knew the floor plan. He knew the teachers. He knew some of the students. He could describe them, which meant this person knew the ins and outs of the academy.

50:11So it's not a journalist. It's not some sicko. No, he is not. He's not a student, though. So what is he? He is the headmaster of the school. Jun Bao. Wow. He goes by JB and JB was going to use this group chat to try and break the students one last time. JB was actually unemployed before he was the founder and headmaster of the academy. he started it in 2013 and there's not much about this guy other than he founded and ran this academy i believe he invested a million usd into the academy to get it started but i did find something that i thought was very telling of his character besides all the torture and crimes he was obsessed with the three obediences and four female virtues of confucianism so you're like what okay i didn't know any of this i was confused the three feminine obediences are a woman is obligated not to act on her own initiatives and must submissively obey or follow her father at home if she has not been married yet, her husband after getting married, and her sons after her husband's death.

51:22The four feminine virtues are womanly speech. Do not use sharp words like, for example, I'm not gonna do that. For example, that's an example of something that's not womanly words. Some interpret this as speak only when the time is right and never utter slanderous words. Choose your words carefully, aka don't talk like ever. Feminine conduct, basically be ashamed of everything and conduct your life around not burgeoning others and not doing anything that society deems as shameful. Feminine hygiene is basically the other one. It just, it's always look amazing and be free of filth and disgrace. Feminine work is the last, which stands for concentrate on your work, keeping home, you know, don't like silly play and don't be so engaged in laughter and gossip.

52:15Prepare wine and food neatly and offer that to guests. I mean, I'm sure there's more modern interpretations of that, but I don't think that JB liked the modern interpretations. I feel like he likes the old school interpretations. He wanted to run his academy off of this. Like that was his whole vision. Creating a bunch of submissive blank slates he could control to line his pockets with money. And now all that hard work is at risk with the stories coming out. I mean, the case is getting a lot of attention online. So JB joins the chat to understand what they're thinking, what they're planning. And it's just so shameless and unhinged.

52:53JB created a fake account to pretend and be one of the students to read the messages of the victims that were talking about what they went through. He saw the most vulnerable parts of the students trauma, the trauma that he created. And he took thorough notes like he's some sort of attorney about every single person so he could find ammunition and figure out what their little motives were. He knew that there might be a legal case. We got he got to work. He hunted down the addresses to all the former victims Matched them up to the names in the group chat and went full stalker mode He would send former students, victims, anonymous messages to scare them into silence And the messages would read Please take responsibility for your words, okay?

53:31Justice will be served You should be clear about your attacks and defamatory words against Yujang Academy If you're willing to be a good person and delete all of your posts We can give you a chance Or else, we have a lot of forces in your local area Smiley face he ended up tracking one of the more passionate and vocal students down and personally going to visit that victim at his personal residence the student's name is leo and leo was at his home when the doorbell rang and he opened it thinking okay it's probably a family friend a family member or maybe my parents have guests he froze and then he snapped out of it pulled out his phone and started recording the headmaster who was at his front doorstep.

54:13JB was pissed, but he was also audacious. He starts questioning Leo. You're going to say things that didn't happen happened, huh? What's this? JB shoves his phone into Leo's face, presumably with screenshots of everything Leo had said in the group chat. And Leo starts screaming, uncle, call the police, uncle, hurry, call the police. Then he turns back to JB and says, you know, I almost died in there, right? Did you know that? Oh, there you go. With your signature smile. The headmaster's just smiling at him. He says, but after so many years, nobody actually died, did they? JB shoves his way into Leo's house at this point, and they're standing in Leo's living room.

54:55Leo picks up his phone to say, hello, I called the police just now and someone just broke in. I suspect that this person could attack any time. Yes, I think this is a life-threatening situation. I'm very scared right now. Eventually, JB leaves, but he doesn't stop harassing the other victims and creating new trauma. He would pose as a student and ask the others personal questions about their lives, wanting to know where they work now, what they do, what school they go to, just so he could try and ruin their lives so that they would take down the post. at one point he starts trying to befriend the volunteers because these are the ones helping organize the information they're kind of like the information hubs of the group chat at one point he befriends one and sends one of them a file and they they open it thinking it was a student sending them proof of abuse that they would add to their files of you know all the evidence their computer starts glitching it was a virus sources state jb hired someone to install a virus on the computer of whoever opened that file and he would be able to look at the files on that person's hard drive.

55:58JB wanted to get the full file on the potential lawsuit. Thankfully, it didn't work, but JB didn't stop. He kept harassing the volunteers, finding out where they work, where they go to school. One of the volunteers' name is Zmo, and we'll call her Mo. Mo was a college student who just volunteered in her free time. I mean, when she's not doing work, She would help organize, set up committees, contact reporters, lawyers. The victims really appreciated her. And she's doing this out of the goodness of her heart. She's not getting any recognition. She's not getting money out of this. JB found out what school she went to, starts calling the university, spreading rumors that she's involved in a crime syndicate.

56:37The rumors started circulating and everyone just treated her differently. Her professors didn't want to help. They didn't want to talk to her. They didn't want to have connections with anyone they thought had ties underground. She dropped out of school because the harassment got so bad. But it trickled into other parts of her life. Her boyfriend started getting calls, rumors about his girlfriend. Thankfully, he didn't believe them. And he knew that his girlfriend was going up against the school. So he just assumed it was Yu Jiang. He was worried about her though. So one day, she stops responding to messages as quickly as she normally does.

57:11And he starts feeling panicked with everything going on lately. This is so out of character. I mean, yeah, he could have just been paranoid, but he didn't want to take the chance. He rushes to her house, finds her unconscious in the bathroom. She had gone into the medicine cabinet and taken six different bottles of cold medicine mixed with prescription drugs. She was rushed to the ER. Her stomach was pumped and thankfully she survived. She would have lifelong stomach and intestinal issues and would receive intense mental therapy after her attempt. She also just kind of lost her hope in the world.

57:45you know she stopped volunteering she stopped working with victims i mean it was just a lot of the victims and even gentle himself said she was one of the best people you would ever meet another volunteer went through a similar harassment situation they were fired from their job because their boss kept getting calls about this person stealing and embezzling from the job they're like you know your employee kevin is stealing and embezzling from you he was fired and gentle's main Weibo, so the guy who leaked the story or exposed the story, it was reported so many times, presumably by JB and his associates, that it was shut down.

58:23When Gentle reached out to Weibo, they said a Mr. Wu, Wu Junbao, was the one that reported him. Gentle was also bombarded with some really strange threats. Someone kept threatening to chop off his hands, put them in a box, and ship them back to him. Other threats just told him, you just wait. Your volunteers have already tried to exit their lives and soon you will try to jb was also busy in other ways he figured the police would investigate the facilities so he fixed up the silent rooms and because that's a big part of the allegations all the pictures we're going to see about the silent room are renovated versions so ignore the ac on top of the wall and by the way the room doesn't even look great after renovation so just imagine how bad it was prior there's now lights in there yeah no they never existed.

59:05JB would try to argue that he used that room to calm students down. It was like a room for reflection, meditation, Zen. Finally, November 8, 2017, the academy was shut down and over 80 students were rescued. JB and the main teachers were arrested and it just reminded everyone of room 13 and Monster Yang. Everyone is like, this feels like a repeat. What's going on? So room 13 was a treatment room in another academy, another rehabilitation center for online addiction. It was started by a man that he called himself Dr. Yang, but everyone calls him Monster Yang. He claimed to be a psychiatrist and professional mental health advocate.

59:47He was neither, okay? But he would electrocute students to get them to change, get them to be obedient. So instead of the silent room, he had room 13. The first thing when a student comes in, they would be admitted into room 13. they would be tied to a bed there would be a strap holding down their foreheads onto the bed so they can't even wiggle their heads around there would be an electroshock therapy device placed on their head they would have a gag in their mouth and when they wake up their eyes are panicked they would be staring at Monster Yang who is now sitting and smiling at the foot of the bed and he was always in his white doctor's coat and he'd ask do you know why you're here?

1:00:25they can't answer because they have a gag in their mouth but it didn't matter because Monster Yang seemed to get off on this. There's like back and forth asking questions and as these students are panicking to answer, he would press a button and electrocute them. Do you admit that what you're doing is wrong? Before they can answer, not that they can, electrocuted. Are you willing to be good? Electrocuted. Do you want to get your treatment done? Electrocuted. One victim said it felt like 10 million needles poking into your brain at once. You just had drool. seeping down your face. Monster Yang didn't care if students peed themselves, if their fingernails were digging into their flesh so hard that they bled, or if they were bleeding from the brain or their nose.

1:01:09I mean, it didn't matter. He would do it until the patient collapsed and obeyed him like a sheep until they were broken. And parents were paying thousands of dollars a month, about$1 ,000 a month for their children to be tortured, essentially. Monster Yang is the one that made$11 million from this. He was really, really, really big at one point. Like he has so many schools and yes he had social media presence oh yeah he was famous parents loved him they thought that he was a child whisperer turns out there is no such thing as a child whisperer just abusers monster yang's treatment center was shut down but no charges were pressed against him and side note when the academy was shut down the thing that made this news blow up even more was there were parents protesting shutting down these types of academies.

1:02:00Not all the parents, but some of them. Protesting for it to not be shut down. Yeah. These are parents whose children have been in the academy or were currently enrolled in the academy. I mean, this just goes against primal instincts to protect your child and want to rip apart anyone that hurts them. But these parents, they truly believe that they're doing this so that their kids can succeed. They're putting them in this academy and helping them. They convince themselves that, You know, which is unbelievable. And maybe they need to go into the silent room to reflect for a moment. But they convinced themselves, we're not doing this for us.

1:02:32We're doing this for our kid. One parent demanded in front of the academy, if you shut down the academy, where are we going to send our kids? Who is going to save our kids? Another one stated, we parents love our children. If they are getting beaten at this academy, of course, we wouldn't want that. But tell me, where is the truth? Where is the proof? Other parents were just screaming, we support the academy, support the academy. Or just, yes, we can accept it. They were tortured, but it was for their own good. Netizens were disgusted by this. I mean, they wrote online, these parents are accomplices, poor kids.

1:03:12These parents don't actually want the best for their kids. They only want to use them as assets and trophies to show off to their loser friends. The trial was just another crap part of this case. A reporter who attended said JB and the other teachers were smiling, giggling, as if they weren't nervous. They didn't seem phased. And I guess that cockiness came from somewhere. July 2020, JB was sentenced to just two years and ten months in prison. His main three accomplices were sentenced anywhere between 11 months to two years and seven months. And as of today, they are all free men. Netizens were outraged.

1:03:49Two to three years is nothing. this level of trauma, that's why they call it generational trauma. It's going to impact these people and their future families for generations. Young said, once I got out, I felt a lot of confusion and trauma. He just kept wondering, was there something that wrong with me that my parents would pay for me to completely change? Did they hate me so much that they wanted me to be a completely different person. Another victim, Shan Shan said, when I saw my mom in the courtyard to pick me up finally, I hugged her and I asked while crying, mom, do you not love me anymore?

1:04:29Is that why you sent me here? Shan Shan said her mother had no clue that she was being abused and that was the first step in her journey to healing. Another former student said after getting out, sure, she was on her phone less. I guess if that's what her parents wanted so badly, fine. But she also couldn't leave the house anymore. She had PTSD. She wants to just lay in the bed and stare at the wall. It took her four extra years to even just graduate high school. She had no friends, no job, no ambition, no motivation, just trauma, just PTSD. And she said, I guess you got what you wanted, right?

1:05:05If it wasn't for the academy, my life would have been so different. And that is the story of Yujang Academy. What are your thoughts? Please leave it in the comments and please be safe. I will see you guys on Sunday for the mini-sode. Bye!