I am attaching her original message (the one that got removed within twenty minutes). What's confusing is that, if the translation is accurate, there really isn't any explicit accusation of sexual assault. He used his power, her vulnerability, and a very bizarre situation to perhaps apply pressure, but it's very vague what actually happened. It is clear, however, that Peng had very deep feelings for this man who she had a relationship with and felt abandoned by him not once, but twice. Unless I have interpreted this incorrectly, she sounds more like a jilted lover than an assault victim, but again...that's just my interpretation of the English interpretation.
Yet the press seems to be echoing the phrase "sexual assault". I'm just wondering, since she is not available to make the accusation herself, where this is coming from?
Regardless whether consensual, manipulated, or forced...this poor lady needs to be found.
I suspect that the debate in this thread is probably taking place in the absence of knowledge of something that's been fairly common currency in the world of elite women's tennis for quite some time now.
When a young kid (I mean around the age of 9-10) is showing serious tennis talent, that kid needs money and patronage to take their promise forwards, via intensive (and very expensive) training camps and funding of their amateur and early-pro careers, if they're to stand any realistic chance of becoming one of the world's top pros in the future.
In countries such as the US, UK, Australia and Germany, it's often the case that the kids either come from reasonably wealthy families, or else they are able to secure funding from transparent relationships with either financial institutions or national tennis associations (for example, Emma Raducanu's very expensive apprenticeship was funded partly by a financial services company and partly by the LTA). This funding is provided on a quasi-venture-capital basis, or similar to the ways in which budding new music artists are (or more accurately: used to be) funded by record companies: the financial outlay is recoupable upon any future pro success by the player, and there's an inbuilt expectation that most of the players funded in this way will never be recoupable.
However, over the past 20-30 years or so, a very distasteful parallel system has been operating in, shall we say, less transparent countries - exclusively concerning young female tennis prospects. It's no coincidence whatsoever that the likes of Russia, China and many central/eastern-European countries have produced vastly more top female pro players than top male pro players. And here's the reason:
Talented and aspiring young (again, typically aged 9-10 or so) female players are identified in these countries. However, instead of being supported by transparent institutions, they are instead supported by powerful and wealthy individuals (or sometimes small consortia of wealthy individuals). And with that support comes an implied quid-pro-quo: as the player develops into adulthood, there's an expectation that she will be required to have some form of sexual relationship with the man/men paying the bills. A particularly invidious element in this process is that the young female will have been being groomed from her early adolescence onwards, to the point where they don't see the subsequent sexual-relations part as being immoral or even unpleasant. And the parents learn to accept it too (or, if they don't, they soon find their daughter cast onto the scrapheap instead of providing them with wealth beyond their dreams as a touring pro player).
I think this is precisely what's been going on with Peng over all these years (and why there's an element of Stockholm Syndrome going on). It's also somewhat common knowledge on the WTA that Sharapova - whose parents were lower-middle-class and from the provinces - was in a similar arrangement for many, many years into her pro career (all those years at Bollettieri in Florida, plus subsistence for her and her family, plus the crazy-expensive funding for her plus a coach in her amateur and early-pro careers... don't come cheap or without a certain degree of palm-greasing).
There are at least several other current WTA Top-100 players who are likewise believed to be in a similar situation. And anyone who believes that Petra Kvitova happened to have her left (dominant) hand sliced open in a "random burglary gone wrong" (official explanation), might apply to me regarding a bridge I'm currently selling: she'd threatened to cut off her, ahem, "benefactor" and was being sent a message.
The Peng situation is, I'm afraid, very likely to be a manifestation of exactly this horrible state of affairs. The one thing I'd hope (and currently believe) is that no physical harm has actually come to her as yet - that she's merely been sequestered away to stop the inconvenient truth coming out, as well as perhaps being "re-educated". Now that China knows the heat is on, however, I'd expect them to spend another several days or so intensively "re-educating" Peng - and reminding her of what she can and cannot say - then "release" her back into the global village.
