In 2019, Li Chenxi got a job at a cultural company through a relative’s introduction. She thought she had landed a secure position, but instead she stepped straight into a trap that could bite. The general manager was sixty, and his tongue was sharper than a knife. He called her “stupid” and “stupid as hell,” berated her at work for being “too old” and “unskilled,” and said she’d “starve without her relatives.” She handled every odd job: accounting, administration, cashiering, cleaning, sending international parcels, visiting the tax office, filling out copyright reports, and translating. She did the work of five people for one person’s pay, and never received a cent in overtime.
For five years, she was blamed for everything: “poor comprehension,” “incompetent,” “bad at her job.”
In 2021, she began reading psychology books and watching TED Talks. She had a vague sense that something was wrong: the belittling, humiliation, and constant negation didn’t seem like “treating her well.” But a voice in her head always argued back: He’s over sixty, so he probably means no harm. Maybe I’m just overthinking it.
It wasn’t until 2026, when she read Stanford professor Robert Sutton’s “The No Asshole Rule,” that she realized every point in the book matched the person who had made her miserable for five years. There was a name for it: workplace bullying.
The relative who had introduced her to the job kept asking afterward, “Don’t you regret quitting?” They thought everything was normal, that she was incompetent, too sensitive, and ungrateful for the opportunity, just “a hopeless mess who could never be helped.”
From 2019 to 2023, five years, more than eighteen hundred days. Every day, she hurt from head to toe. Her body hurt, but her heart hurt even more.
This is a story about “only realizing it hurts after being kicked for five years.”
