Domestic Abuse Case Of A M’sian Chinese Girl Due To Racism

TW: Photos depicting cuts and bruises (given to Cilisos with consent to include in article), Mentions of physical violence and domestic abuse

This is the case of a 23-year-old Chinese girl who was allegedly domestically abused by her own family for being in a relationship with a Malay.

Dong Yi grew up in Ipoh with her parents and three siblings. Despite leading a relatively normal childhood and witnessing the “casual” racism of her parents, she never expected it to shift into physical violence until August 2023, when her parents instructed her two brothers to pin her down to the floor while they repeatedly beat her until she bled and bruised.

To understand the full extent of Dong Yi’s abuse, we have constructed a timeline of events leading up to present day, which we established after a conversation with Dong Yi and her 22-year-old boyfriend, Emir. We also reached out to Dong Yi’s family for a statement, which will be shown later in the article.

Note: All of the incidents mentioned below are alleged and at the time of writing, the case is still ongoing.

April 2023: The beginning of their relationship

Dong Yi and Emir began a casual relationship in April of this year. While the two saw each other whenever they were in the same city, their relationship was never made known to Dong Yi’s parents until much later.

Emir always had the suspicion that his girlfriend’s parents would disapprove, especially because of the remarks that they had made in the past in regards to Malays.

“My dad had a lot of Malay friends, but whenever he met-up with his friends, he would come back home and say, ‘I’ve interacted with many Malays and I can tell you that Malays are slow.’ He would use all the negative words to describe his Malay friends. – Dong Yi

Despite that, the family has denied their racism after being called out on Instagram. Replying to someone who commented on their IG Story, the family wrote the messages shown below:

Since the relationship was casual, Emir never felt the need to address the suspicion until Dong Yi finally introduced him to her parents – as a friend.

Everything was going well and Dong Yi’s father even showed genuine interest in Emir. The subject then shifted towards Emir’s job and at the time, he was in Digital Marketing. Her father approved until Emir mentioned his music career as well, which triggered a speech implying that Malays were lazy.

“Everything in the room started to change. That’s when he said, ‘The 26% of Chinese in Malaysia are very hardworking. We don’t even have the Bumiputera rights, but we still thrive. We’re richer than the Malays because we are more hardworking.’

“It’s crazy because he was saying all of this while we were in public and we were seating beside a Malay family. I didn’t know what to do, so I just laughed it off.” – Emir

To dismiss Emir even further, Dong Yi’s mother started showing pictures of her daughter’s friends, who were all Chinese, suggesting that these men would be a “perfect match” for her.

While that situation was unpleasant, they never expected that it could escalate into something unthinkable.

July 2023: The beginning of verbal abuse

After months of dating, Dong Yi finally admitted that she was dating Emir. The initial response was disappointing, but not at all shocking. From then on, her family started pestering her about Emir.

“They would remind me of my ‘bad decision’ of having a Malay as a partner everyday. They would ask me things like, ‘Can you please just do this one thing for me? Don’t be with a Malay,’ and ‘We raised you for 23 years. Can you sacrifice this one thing for me?’

“They were never on my side. They were selfish.” – Dong Yi

The verbal abuse got worse when she started fighting back, to the point where her parents disowned her and suggested that she left the house. It got to a point when Dong Yi couldn’t sleep because her physical and mental health were deteriorating. She thought she was experiencing the worst of it until August rolled around.

August 2023: The beginning of physical violence

After weeks of heightened tension between Dong Yi and her family, it finally came to a climax when the arguments started getting physical.

It started when her family accused Emir of performing witchcraft or ‘sihir’, and because of that, their first solution was to snap Dong Yi out of it – through violence.

 

In our conversation, Dong Yi seemed visibly distressed as she recounted the incident.

“They beat me up and slapped me multiple times ’til my left eyebrow was fractured and swollen. I got cuts, like my tissue here [pointing towards her face] and my ear was bleeding. I got bruises all over my body after that.

“Their excuse was they wanted to wake me up from some magic shit. They thought that I was possessed.

“My dad was literally on top of me, pinning me down on the ground, while my brothers held my leg and my arms. My sister was at my side screaming at me, ‘F*cking wake up! This is not you!’

“My mom said, ‘Yeah, slap her more!’ They would keep doing this for hours in my room and I couldn’t get out because they were all blocking the entrance. I felt very helpless.” – Dong Yi

Their next attempt to snap Dong Yi out of the alleged black magic came when they tried to seize her phone to get Emir’s contact.

They believed that by getting his phone number, they would be able to send a sihir back to him. In order to get Dong Yi’s cellphone, they scratched her until she bled. Afterwards, her father forced her to take a shower and clean-up the mess.

 

She decided it was high time that she got out, but before she left, they manipulated her one last time – in person.

“They wanted to persuade me to stay. My mom was like, ‘Can you forgive me? I know what I did was wrong, but I’m your only mom and you are my daughter’. She was crying.

“I know what is wrong and what is right and even when they beat me, I was conscious. So, I told them, ‘I forgive you, but I can’t stay. I just want to get out. I’m traumatised and I need time.’

“My dad was there too and he asked if I could stay until my internship was over because he didn’t feel good about me leaving. And that is how selfish they are. That’s how they gaslighted me because they know my weakness, which is the fact that I love my family.” – Dong Yi

With that, she packed up, got out, went to the hospital and lodged a police report that same night.

Who helped her carry this out? Emir, the “useless Malay boy”.

“That night, I was actually supposed to get dinner with my friends and we were chilling together, but we already knew something was wrong with Dong Yi.

“I received a message on my Instagram and it was Dong Yi’s sister. She messaged me something along the lines of, ‘Give me your phone number’, but it was very rude. I decided to confront her with a call. I asked for advice from my friends before I did anything. They agreed that I should video call her while they recorded it. So we did.

“Dong Yi was already on her way out, walking outside to get to a Grab to go somewhere else. While that was happening, I was on a call with her dad and I could hear her sister crying, loudly.

“He lied through his teeth and said she was just ‘playing with her brothers’ and ‘you know how siblings are’, but I knew something was very wrong. The most f*cked-up part was how casual he sounded when he asked for my contact number.

“He said, ‘I need your contact in case Dong Yi finds herself in jail. I want to know where my daughter is at all times because I don’t want my daughter to end up in human trafficking.’ They accused me of kidnapping, human trafficking and using a bomoh.

“Not long after that, I received a call from Dong Yi. She tried to sound calm, but I already knew that something was up. That’s when she told me her ears were bleeding. I just told her to send me her location.” – Emir

The footage recorded that night will be used in court, which is why they can’t share it, but it depicted the moment Dong Yi was being beaten.

Emir sped all the way to Ipoh, and normally the journey would take him 2 hours, but at the speed he was going, he reached Dong Yi in only one. He picked her up and helped her lodge the police report, but even that proved to be futile. The inspector that was assigned to their case after the police report in Ipoh stopped responding after less than a week.

Take a look at Dong Yi’s messages below:

 

To them, the abuse was obvious, especially since Dong Yi showed up to the police department bruised and bleeding. But after the report, and despite multiple attempts to reach out for almost 2 months, they gave up, since they were already busy with their internship and work.

Below is the copy of their police report:

You would think that after escaping her home, Dong Yi could find some semblance of peace and solace, but in actuality…

September 2023: The beginning of the harassment towards Dong Yi and Emir

Even after leaving her home, Dong Yi was still harassed via text messages and calls from her family members. The couple blocked the numbers and social media accounts, but the family still found ways to disturb them.

When Dong Yi and Emir became unreachable, a female relative decided to message Emir’s record label. This female relative accused Emir of brainwashing Dong Yi and urged the label to drop him as an artist. She even accused Emir of being capable of human trafficking and prostitution in a text she sent to Dong Yi.

Read the screenshots below:

 

This female relative, who refers to Dong Yi as her “niece” despite not being blood-related, is actually a kindergarten principal – a person who is supposed to prioritise the safety and well-being of children.

Despite the ongoing harassment, Emir was determined to help Dong Yi heal, but it was difficult for her due to the immense trauma she had suffered.

“After I got out, it was hard for me to live as a person because I couldn’t carry myself as an individual. They have been grooming me and everything they said, I had to listen.

“‘You have no opinion, you have no beliefs, you have no voice,’ that is what they have been saying to me.” – Dong Yi

Dong Yi’s family would not stop harassing her, but the couple remained patient. It was only until they reached their final straw that it spearheaded Dong Yi and Emir’s pursuit for justice.

October 2023: Exposing the abuse online

This case was brought to our attention when Emir started posting on his Instagram, detailing the entire incident with screenshots of conversations with Dong Yi’s family members and photo evidence of the abuse.

 

Part of the evidence against her family came in the form of an Instagram account, which we have reason to believe was set up by Dong Yi’s sister, with the username @pleasecomebackdongyi. This account’s sole purpose is to plead for Dong Yi to return, while spreading accusations towards Emir.

According to them, Dong Yi did not leave on her own accord, but was instead kidnapped and brainwashed by Emir, who also used black magic on her.

The Instagram account was only made known to the couple 3-4 days before Cilisos held the interview with them.

Click to enlarge images.

Due to the constant slew of harassment, the couple lodged 2 other police reports in Selangor. However, they made it clear that they did not lodge these reports within the vicinity of their homes in fear that Dong Yi’s family could track down their current location.

It’s gotten to a point where Emir even fears for his life, stating that he had to email a proposal to his boss and HR to consider him a hybrid worker, which allows flexibility for him to work from home.

“I don’t want to be out on the street worrying if someone is going to stab me.” – Emir

The family’s response

After hearing the story from Dong Yi and Emir’s point of view, we decided to reach out to her family to hear their side. Here are the messages we sent to Dong Yi’s father and sister, respectively:

 

 

We did not hear back from these profiles, however, we seemed to have caught the family’s attention because the Instagram account mentioned before, @pleasecomebackdongyi, requested to follow us.

In our conversation with the admin of the account, which we believe could be Dong Yi’s sister, we asked if they would answer specific questions related to the alleged domestic abuse. However, the admin kept dodging the questions and redirecting it to how the family has been saddened by Dong Yi’s “disappearance” and how they never intended to “hurt anyone”.

According to them, this situation is purely Emir’s fault, and they never blamed it on Dong Yi. In fact, the admin kept emphasising how the family is “loving” and how “racism and abuse is not in their dictionary”. It was revealed that the family even lodged a police report of their own against Emir. After we kept insisting for them to address the domestic abuse, the admin stopped replying.

Read the full conversation below:

 

Below is the police report lodged by Dong Yi’s father:

We found this copy of the police report after discovering the Facebook version of the Instagram account, @pleasecomebackdongyi. There we could see multiple postings pleading for Dong Yi to return.

Here are a few screenshots of those posts:

Current day

At the time of writing, Dong Yi is currently working and Emir is completing his internship, but the both of them are still trying to pursue legal action against her family.

“Currently, we have yet to find ourselves a lawyer. We’re trying to get a pro bono lawyer because we can’t afford to pay, honestly. But at the same time, we don’t want to let this case slip through the cracks. That’s why we’re seeking help with the media to create awareness, not just for abuse, but specifically for Dong Yi herself.

“Maybe from the reach, we can get in touch with lawyers. That’s what we’re going for, honestly. We want to put an end to this.

“We didn’t try to make this case viral in the beginning because Dong Yi was thinking about her siblings. Her brothers are still underage; they’re still in high-school. We didn’t want to make things harder for them to find a job or register for university.

“If you asked me, I was furious that night, but I could tell that Dong Yi wasn’t strong enough to admit that her family f*cked up.” – Emir

But now, enough is enough.

After presenting both sides of the story, if you believe Dong Yi and Emir, there are ways for you to help them.

If you happen to know a lawyer – or if you are a lawyer yourself – you can contact the couple and provide assistance. Simply send them an email at [email protected]

If you have experienced domestic violence and wish to report it, contact:

WOMEN’S AID ORGANISATION (WAO)
Operating hours: 24-hour
Contact: +603-79563488
SMS/WhatsApp: +6018-9888058
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