Those Chinese videos...

I would guess most of the spanko community has seen some of the plethora of Chinese videos that hit the scene recently, mainly on TikTok and YouTube. It started with pairs of players doing the old classic rock-paper-scissors game, where the winner got to whack the loser with an implement - mostly resembling a paddle, a cane or a belt and invariably across their bottom while they bent forward submissively.

The initial torrent of videos may have abated a little but there are also plenty of new ones. It's difficult to reliably keep track of when already posted videos have been reposted from other accounts. There have also been some variations - some great fun and others rather confusing. The confusing ones are particularly those where more than two players take part. So, for example, there are quite a few with two boys and one girl - one boy challenges the girl to the rock-paper-scissors game. If she wins she gets to whack both of the boys but if she loses, each of the boys gets to whack her. It's not rocket science to calculate that each outcome has a 50:50 chance of happening, meaning she is going to get hit twice as many times as either of them. I struggle to see how she is persuaded to agree to that.

Then there have been several videos where they use large elastic bands (resistance bands?) stretched tightly around the loser and then released giving a sharp stinging impact on a quite precisely controlled area. There has also been a bit more variation in targets. Perhaps it's a surprise that sometimes they have been delivered to bare legs, for example, leaving the 'victim' with very publicly visible marks.

Right from the outset, they seem to have played these games with little concern about being overseen by others. However, there have been a handful of video clips starting to appear in very public settings such as a busy shopping district. The lack of intervention by those passing by might suggest that there is, at least in some places, quite widespread knowledge and acceptance of the games.

There have also been a few where, instead of bending forward, the 'victim' is lying face down on a bench or table and they are beaten with what appear to be really large planks of wood. While these may seem strange to the Western eye, they probably reflect a form of punishment that was quite widespread in the past in China.

There have also been some alternative games to replace rock-paper-scissors. The most popular seems to be the use of large dice. Although initial use seemed to be restricted to 'largest number wins' they have mostly moved on to the loser getting the number of strokes reflected by the winner's throw. Sometimes it's not competitive - the boy throws and gives the girl the number he's thrown and then she throws and gives him the number she's thrown. Very occasionally I have seen a loser having to endure six hard strokes - unfortunately, the girls seem to very rarely be able to stay in position throughout the punishment.

There are a very large number of accounts posting - I have counted 38 TikTok accounts (the most prolific being @thutrangcl, @thichdangvd, @qupewss11, and most prolific of all @tieutudi) and well over 60 YouTube channels (most prolific being Girl's funny, Man man, and Funny Brave Challenge). Another YouTube channel called Anokha channel D posted a lot of videos but now seems to have gone a bit quieter - the interesting thing here is that whereas most clips are around 3-5 minutes long, on this last channel their clips are compilations usually running to 11-15 minutes).

One interesting development I've noticed recently is that some TikTok postings have had a warning notice posted on them.

Look right to the bottom of this screen. I would have thought this was rather unnecessary and obvious to anyone. I wonder if there are any people in other countries who are ready to risk disregarding the warning...