A Chinese university has announced the expulsion of a female student for "damaging national dignity" due to her relationship with a foreign man.
The move has sparked heated debate across Chinese social media.
The decision by Dalian Polytechnic University, located in the country's northeast, said the student would be "expelled" in 60 days for violating a rule against "having improper interactions with foreigners that damage national dignity".
“Your misbehaviours on December 16, 2024, caused a terrible negative impact,” the announcement said, without going into further detail.
The university also published the student’s full name.
Over recent days, the expulsion has drawn thousands of comments on platforms like Xiaohongshu and Douyin, China's version of TikTok.
Many users are questioning whether the university has the right to judge her personal life and elevate it to a matter of national importance, debating if the institution has gone too far.
The university's actions illustrate a number of issues percolating in modern Chinese society, including discussions around gender bias and a full-on push toward nationalism.
Chinese internet users have connected the accused university student to videos posted by Danylo Teslenko, also known as Zeus, a professional Ukrainian gamer.
The videos showed him being intimate with a young woman in a hotel room. The Associated Press could not independently verify if the woman in the video is the student.
Some on social media called the school's decision to expel the student a sign of the “Taliban style”, by which a particular nation or group claims ownership over a woman's body.
Others call it misogyny, asking if a Chinese man would be considered a “national pride” if he had sex with a foreign woman.
The Paper, a state-run newspaper in Shanghai, said it was not just “inappropriate” to publish the student's full name but also "may even violate the Personal Information Protection Law.”
“It is improper to graft private affairs onto the public domain for public disposal,” said The Paper.
Mr Teslenko confirmed on Sunday that he posted “a few videos on Telegram with a girl I met in Shanghai” but later deleted them “as soon as I understood the seriousness of the situation”, according to his post on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“Our faces were visible, but there was no explicit content or anything disrespectful in those videos,” the post said.
“I have never said that Chinese girls are easy.”
Media reports have said Mr Teslenko and the student met at the final of the Perfect World Shanghai Major, a gaming competition held in December 2024.
An email sent to Dalian Polytechnic University was not immediately answered.
