China’s Real-Life “Squid Game” Is Here

An ominous challenge resembling Netflix's brutal Squid Game is ensnaring Chinese people and wreaking havoc. Welcome to China Uncensored, I'm Chris Chappell. Throughout the years, all sorts of different challenges have spread far and wide across Chinese social media platforms. For example, there's the infamous Skinny Challenges, where you have to show how skinny you are by doing things like tying an earphone cable around your waist, or reach around your back to touch your belly button. This is one time starving under communism could actually benefit someone. There are also several martial arts challenges involving impressive kicks and high jumps. And then there's this one, where people are supposed to enter or exit a subway train, and then ta-da! For this one, though, you gotta be careful you don't get stuck in the subway time and space loop. This is what delays on New York Transit feel like. While many Chinese online challenges are about showing off and having fun, riskier kinds have recently emerged with higher stakes and under darker circumstances. Some of these are evoking eerie comparisons to the Netflix hit series Squid Game, where a group of financially distressed contestants in South Korea compete against each other in a sequence of games over an astronomical cash reward that can only be claimed by the last person alive. The most common such challenge in China often starts with an ad on a social media platform like Douyin, showing footage of a person alone in a room going about their day. This is accompanied by text and a voice explaining how a lot of money has been won by contestants taking up a self-isolation challenge, requiring them to simply stay in a hotel room for about a month, while outside staff made sure that they had all they needed, even providing three meals a day. Doesn't sound too bad. Kind of just sounds like China's brutal new prison system, minus most of the more brutal elements. Other videos show people the moment they successfully complete the self-isolation, being cheerfully greeted by an organizer and presented with a cash prize of as much as 1 million yuan, about $140,000. They made that much cash just by not interacting with anyone for a month? I do that every month. I haven't left this room since 2012. And Chinese people out there feeling jealous at this point in the story can rejoice, because now they can have a shot at the prize money, too. These videos are accompanied by the contact info of the organizers. And a quick phone call is usually all it takes to get the green light from the operator, and soon after, receive the documents outlining the rules of the game. Hopefully this isn't so much like Squid Game that this is the one who gives you the green light. The rules usually don't allow eating and drinking anything other than the food provided at each meal. They also forbid smoking, using electronic devices, bathroom breaks exceeding 15 minutes, as well as any contact with people not involved in the challenge. At the same time, players are often not allowed to cover up their faces or do anything that restricts or limits the view of the surveillance cameras that will be monitoring their activities in the room 24-7 during the self-isolation. So it's like an OnlyFans stream you can't leave. Going to need to update Dante's list and add this as the 10th circle of hell. These rules might sound strict, but bear in mind that many Chinese people recently lived through years of the Chinese government's draconian zero-covid policy, where life was dictated by unpredictable red and green health codes, as well as the wanton cruelty of Chinese officials wearing hazmat suits. So for many, this feels less like a challenge and more like nostalgia. Many people experienced being locked down completely in their apartments for more than a month, sometimes with limited access to food and drink. By the time they were allowed to re-emerge, they were greeted by a surging covid death toll during the chaotic end of the zero-covid policy. And they were welcomed by an ailing economy, rather than a million yuan. I'm starting to see the appeal of this from their perspective. For people that lived through that, a self-isolation challenge probably sounds like a test they've already aced. And with a major cash prize waiting on the other side, they are within reach of a well-deserved reward after the years of covid hardships. So many willingly accept the terms of the game, as well as pay the around $1,000 fee that is usually required by most organizers—a small price to pay when you're pretty much set up to win $140,000. I'm sure nothing bad can happen when people drop a ton of money expecting to win even more in the long game. That's why all gambling addicts are millionaires. When people afterwards check into the designated isolation location, it makes sense if they feel confident about what lies ahead. But as you might expect, few participants get anywhere close to completing the challenge. In fact, most are disqualified after only a few days into it. One player named Sun from Shandong Province was eliminated after organizers said that he had covered his face with a pillow, which violated the rules. Yeah, it's pretty tricky to relive the covid pandemic and not cover your face. Another contestant named Zhang from Shanxi Province was disqualified after he turned away from one of the cameras while making his bed. That actually happened on Zhang's second try. On his third try, the staff accused him of breaking the rules by covering a can of beer left in the room, and then eliminated him because touching alcoholic beverages was considered a violation, even though he didn't drink it. At that point, Zhang had spent nearly $3,000 on the challenge. A different Zhang, this one from Shanghai, spent nearly $14,000 on 10 attempts at winning a self-isolation prize of around $55,000, and was at one point eliminated when organizers accused him of placing his backpack on a couch in his room in a way that violated the video surveillance rules. Which is insane, but that's ok, I'm sure his 11th time will be successful. Zhang from Shanxi later told a Chinese outlet that a relative told me that this is an outright scam, adding that the rules sound simple, but the challenge pushes the limits of human endurance and is essentially impossible to complete. Now it makes sense why some unscrupulous companies would set up scams like this. They're able to rake in thousands of dollars in fees from players that are prepared to take a whole month out of their life trusting that they have a fair shot of winning the prize money, when in reality, the scammers have no intention of letting anyone prevail and claim the winnings no matter how many times they try. Except maybe the 11th time? Surely that time's the charm. At the same time, given that scammers are using the footage they've collected from former players to market their schemes to potential new players, it's not unlikely that they're also making money selling some of this footage online, given that China has a market for recordings of people in private settings. Some hotel owners have even been busted for having installed spy cameras into the rooms they rent out to guests, enabling them to get their hands on footage that they can sell online. It's a shocking scandal that I talked about in this video. So the question is not why crooked fraudsters would set up scams disguised as self-isolation challenges. It's more a question of why anyone in China would take the risk and sign up for such a challenge when the country is a notorious hotbed of tricksters and home to some of the biggest scam networks in the world. Except for the CCP, of course. I'm sure communism will improve the citizens' lives any decade now. Scams have become such a big problem that the Chinese authorities even launched a fraud awareness campaign in the middle of last year. Although they're so corrupt, I wouldn't be surprised if they scammed money out of it while warning about scams for money. But the scams are still thriving, and there's one big reason why. You see, China's economy remains in the dumps, which is hitting young people particularly hard with record youth unemployment. One 24-year-old college graduate recently had to move back in with her parents when she got nowhere after sending out hundreds of resumes and failing to pass two civil service exams. She told Voice of America that it's been a year since I graduated from university, but I have no income, no savings, and no social life. No money and no social life? Hey, I heard of a great challenge that should be easy for you to...oh, yeah, I see how that's easy to fall for. Under equally difficult circumstances, many people simply give up and embrace their unemployment, with some even opting to become full-time children back home with their parents. Which is maybe the only job where the benefits include pizza rolls and free laundry. But many others have to keep toiling, flocking to recruitment fairs across China along with the many thousands in a similar situation in the hope that it will land them a job. Some also build up mountains of debt in their struggle to make ends meet until they can hopefully find employment, preferably in a real job that offers pizza rolls and free laundry. That depressing cocktail has made Chinese people easy targets for scammers. Zhang from Shanxi, who ended up spending around $3,000 on the self-isolation scam, fit the profile perfectly, given that he was unemployed and drowning in debt when he came across the ad for the challenge. According to Chinese media Sixtone, when Zhang saw the ad, he felt like he'd been offered a chance to turn his life around. But instead, he ended up with even more debt. But Chinese people are not taking the ripoffs lying down. They're fighting back against the scammers. Sun from Shandong, who lost 6,000 yuan—about $840—during his Go With the Self-Isolation challenge, sued the organizer and won in court. Now ironically, it's the scammer who's trying to hide his face. The only problem was that the company behind the challenge was reportedly only ordered to pay him 5,400 yuan—about $760—in damages, which is less than what he lost to the scam. Chinese courts are not exactly known for their fairness, given that they are firmly under the control of the Chinese Communist Party. But hitting back at scam operations spitting out schemes across China that are being compared to a real-life squid game should really be in everyone's interest, including the CCP's. Especially considering how favorable the situation has actually become for the scam industry these days. But hey, maybe the CCP isn't actively punishing the scammers, because as scammers themselves, game recognizes game. The Chinese authorities have said that the lack of other job prospects is pushing some students to become scammers themselves. While incidents of young graduates with advanced college degrees joining scam syndicates have also increased. So the scammed are becoming scammers themselves. I knew scammers were monsters, but I didn't realize they spread like vampires. Fraudster networks with lots of young recruits available, plenty of potential victims to prey on, and facing minimal pushback by the authorities is not a great scenario for the country. After all, who wants to live in a society where the most realistic job that people can hope for after graduation is as a squid game enforcer? Or would that actually be an upgrade when compared to being an enforcer for the scammers that are currently ruling China, leaving people broke and hungry? But on the bright side, that helps them crush this challenge. And have you ever wondered what's up with college professors and whips? Yes? Me too. Check out the latest episode of my new show, Deep Thoughts While Gaming, about what Indiana Jones teaches us about the life of your average college professor. Click here and let me know what you think. Once again, I'm Chris Chappell. See you next time.