Chinese couple sells their children to pay for online game obsession

If you have any ties to gamers, you likely know of at least one person with an unhealthy MMO habit. As bad as that can get, it’s one thing to brush off your responsibilities and social life – it’s another thing entirely when you sell your kids to fund your habit. And that’s apparently what a Chinese couple in south China has done.

ABC News picked up on a story that alleges Li Lin and Li Juan, reportedly both under the age of 21, sold all three of their children in order to indulge in their online gaming addiction at a local internet cafe a short distance from their home.

As the report goes, the couple met at the nearby internet cafe back in 2007 and, after discovering they had a disturbing gaming habit in common, the two ‘bonded’. About a year later, the couple had their first child. Only a few days after their newborn son was brought home, the couple left him behind to take a trip over to their internet cafe of choice.

The couple went on to have two other children, and it was at that point they cooked up a scheme to sell off all three of their children to fund their obsession. They sold their second child, a baby girl, for around $500. They then sold off their first boy for around $4,500 and, upon having their third child, a boy, sold him off as well, also for $4,500.

According to the source, the couple sold their children because they didn’t “want to raise them, [they] just [wanted] to sell them for some money.” The source reports that the couple had no idea that selling their children was illegal.

ABC News (via Destructoid)