ABSTRACT
Breaking the silence and building the momentum of the MeToo movement through social platforms is only the beginning, countering rape culture and creating an institutional legacy relies on legislation and justice, as well as the cultural framework of the media. This chapter illustrates the dynamics between the cases of the Chinese version of MeToo – “RiceBunny(米兔)” – which entered the civil court and the media. The author observes that journalism has been weakened by censorship and technological and commercial shifts and that the social media environment has both empowering aspects and manipulation of information. Mainstream news outlets have struggled with the regular coverage of the RiceBunny movement because of state regulation, the structure and financing of the industry, and some have even become mouthpieces for privileged perpetrators. In contrast, Internet content production organisations and citizen media, which are not granted journalistic rights by the state, have played a more active and substantial role in promoting the anti-sexual assault agenda. In the process of this analysis, the author highlights cases of strategic use of media by activists, the formation of citizen media networks based on the voices and mutual support of survivors, and cases where citizen media contributed to the judicial process and countered information manipulation. The author argues that media presentation in RiceBunny reflects the nuances of China's media structure but also highlights the important role of civic engagement in it.
