By now, most people know better than to trust a random “free stuff” clip on social media. Apparently, a few hundred people in rural China missed that memo.
Earlier this month, chili pepper farmers in Liujiagou Village, Shaanxi, woke up to find strangers marching through their fields with sacks and crates, stripping plants bare because a viral video told them the peppers were free.
In the clip, shared on Chinese social media and reported by Oddity Central, a man claimed there were “thousands of acres of chili peppers” and declared, “Whoever picks them owns them,” adding that the supposed “boss” had spent 30,000 yuan ($4,239) on workers and could only sell the crop for 18,000 ($2,544).
Off camera, there was no single boss and no grand act of generosity. Just several small farmers, each with their own plots and debts. One of them, a grower identified as Yang, had about 33 acres of peppers and was still trying to line up buyers. According to Asia Economy, Yang said he had “no connection whatsoever” to the man in the video and never told anyone they could take the peppers because he could not sell them.
When he saw strangers filling bags in his fields, Yang tried to stop them, shouting that the video was false and, “This is theft,” but a lone farmer yelling at a crowd is no match for a viral rumor. The situation only calmed down after police, local officials, and road administrators arrived. A few people returned what they had picked. Many more drove away with it.
Police later confirmed the video was fabricated and arrested the man behind it. He received seven days of administrative detention and reached a settlement to pay the farmers 5,000 yuan (around $706) in compensation, a sum that barely touches the value of a looted harvest.
The fake-pepper-giveaway is part of a pattern. Chinese media have reported similar hoaxes about cabbage fields being “no longer useful,” which brought hundreds of people to one farm in Inner Mongolia. In Poland, a viral post claiming potatoes were free led strangers to haul off around 150 tons while the farmer was at a family gathering.
On screen, these clips look like feel-good stories about “unused” crops going to the public. On the ground, they mean strangers walking into fields and taking someone else’s livelihood. By the time the video stops trending, the farmers are still the ones bearing the loss.
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