X

Web Junkie Doc: Inside China’s Teen Internet-Addict Rehab


January 8, 2014 | Marina Galperina

China’s authorities considers heavy internet use a clinical condition. To combat what they think is a critical epidemic and the downfall of its youth, the government sets up special treatment facilities to cure teenagers, to take them out of their online life into the presumably healthier “real” life with some very “unorthodox psychological sessions.” The facilities look like prison camps.

The new documentary Web Junkie looks at how the flux of technology is “destroying” the youth, but then, it digs deeper to explore “why they feel more connected to disassociated voices in cyberspace than to their families,” what does that mean for China, and what could possibly happen next.

Web Junkie screens at Sundance Film Festival later this month.