How cruel was the "Baby Tower" in the late Qing Dynasty?

There is an old Chinese saying that a tiger cannot eat its seeds if it is poisonous, and a poisonous person cannot bear to be kissed. It means that no matter how ferocious the tiger is, it will not eat its own children, but once a person becomes vicious, he will not even dare to approach his relatives. This sentence also profoundly reveals the evil nature of human nature, which can even abandon one's own children. In Fuzhou, there is a "Baby Tower" built in the late Qing Dynasty, which was a place specifically used to discard babies. How cruel is this "Baby Tower"? How cruel was the "Baby Tower" in the late Qing Dynasty? Let the baby fend for itself

In the late Qing Dynasty, a foreign female photographer took many photos in Fuzhou, and the contents of these photos were all made of stone bricks. These towers are scattered in the wilderness and are made of gray stone bricks. There are small openings in the four directions of southeast and northwest. Adults throw abandoned babies into them through these openings. Inside the tower, the baby was left to fend for itself.

According to the records of this foreign female photographer, these towers look like "pigeon cages" in the distance, and the tops of the tower spiers can be seen from a long distance. But these towers are not used to raise pigeons, but are places where locals abandon their babies. These babies were thrown into the tower without even coffins. Their parents left the babies to fend for themselves in the tower. Many people find her records very unbelievable, but those photos clearly reflect the cruelty of reality.

According to historical records, these "baby towers" are very common in Fuzhou, but they are also distributed in other parts of the country. This phenomenon became more common in the late Qing Dynasty. . In ancient my country's traditional concepts, the idea of ????preferring boys over girls is deeply ingrained. Most families are very eager to have a boy to carry on the family line, which makes those girls born seem dispensable. If the family is in better condition, they may choose to continue raising the girl. If the family is relatively poor and cannot afford to support so many children, the parents will throw the girls into the baby tower and let the babies fend for themselves. Especially in the late Qing Dynasty, due to social chaos, the phenomenon of abandoning babies became more and more common.

In addition to some abandoned baby girls, some of the corpses in the tower were due to congenital diseases at birth. Because the medical level in ancient times was relatively poor, these children's families did not have enough He used money to treat their diseases, but in the end he had no choice but to throw the newborn baby into the tower. There is even a local profession in Fuzhou that specializes in discarding babies for some families. They would collect the corpses of these babies and dump them into the tower. They would usually burn the corpses in the tower every three or four days. This can also be seen from this how terrible the number of babies abandoned at that time was.

How cruel was the "Baby Tower" in the late Qing Dynasty? It is said that no one dares to live in these "baby towers" for miles around. Some people will even hear the cry of babies when passing by, and they can't help but speed up and leave this place as soon as possible. Because the ancients were also superstitious, they built these towers into the shape of small temples, and even enshrined statues of gods in the towers to purify the sins in the towers.

With the development of society, people’s mentality of favoring boys over girls has also changed. Most parents will treat boys and girls equally. Even if some parents have to abandon their children, there are also special welfare homes for adoption, instead of putting the baby in a "baby tower" like in ancient times and letting the baby fend for itself.