Domestic violence is commonplace in China. Every Chinese person I've had an intimate conversation with has told me about instances of domestic violence in their family (infrequent in some cases; habitual in others).

I've been in a similar situation to the one you witnessed (also in a public area at university). I was sitting outside having lunch. A girl was standing nearby with two big bags of shopping. Then her boyfriend/husband arrived, put his face close to hers and said something in a threatening tone, then slapped her very hard in the face. I got up promptly to intervene, at which time the boy stormed off in the other direction. I tried to ask the girl if she was OK, but she just said "It's nothing" with a very red face, and tears. I offered to take her shopping bags (having no idea what else to do), but couldn't get another word out of her. So I left feeling exceedingly powerless, frustrated and confused about what I should have done (in hindsight there is actually no good answer).

Twice, while riding past on a public bus, I've seen a domestic punch-up in progress on the street - a man punching and kicking a woman. In one case the woman was giving it her best as well, and in the other she just stood there screaming about something while being repeatedly kicked to the side of her body. On both occasions there were scores of onlookers standing at a safe distance. Went home feeling sick (followed by a succession of other negative emotions).

Last year, while in a restaurant with a friend, I saw a 20-something obviously bad boy sitting with two vain-looking girls. The girls were laughing about something, and then the boy reached across the table and grabbed one of them by the hair and pulled it hard, then smacked her face. The girls went completely silent, with that one pretending not to cry. A rather tense few minutes followed. Then the girl started apologising, and then started trying to cheer the boy up, while the boy sat there brooding. By the time they left the girls were in outwardly high spirits and the boy still acting like a colossal shit. One of those situations that would be so straightforward in any other country, because everyone else would be on the right side.

Unfortunately in China, one is surrounded by morally inert, cowardly, misogynistic racists, most of whom grew up with domestic violence, most of whom would also encourage their sons to be vicious and tantrum-prone, and all of whom would be incensed if a foreigner interfered in a Chinese person's business. So - another situation that left me with a bad taste in my mouth, and one rung lower in the pit of cynicism, resignation and despair.

So, China, better get on that issue of the Diaoyu Islands promptly. That's your chief problem right there.

I agree that it's rather common in China. But  I believe nowadays less and less Chinese ladies would tolerate such treatment.

I've seen it a couple of times. But when I am walking inside the community, where  the traffic noise is distant, there are 3 types of sounds. Dogs Barking, Construction/Renovation and People yelling at each other. 

About two weeks ago, at 3:00 a.m., one of the neighbors, an Irish-American guy from Chicago, married to a really sweet Chinese gal, came home (again) riproaring drunk from one of his many prowls during the week.  In the short time that they have been married, the wife has been a true martyr,

Anyway, he had lost his keys in the bar (or was a public house) and he banged drunkely on all of the doors of our building until his wife open and took him in.  By that time, the entire building was awake.

He then proceeded to have a loud quarrel with his wife and I don't know what happened next but ... she called her father, her uncle and her nephew, and they came with a carload of friends and the Irish-American kid from Chicago had Chinese tribal justice administered to him, to put it politely.  Not one neighbor called the police.

When the administration of the Chinese tribal justice was over, the father and nephew ejected him from the flat onto the street rather forcefully shall we say.  His wife opened the fourth floor windows and threw out two suitcases and then threw out some or all of his belongings.  By this time it was nearly 5:00 a.m.  Not one neighbor called the police.

She changed her locks the next morning and the drunken lout is not allowed to enter into our gated community.

So yes, I have seen and heard domestic violence in China, but it was multicultural domestic violence.

We all warned her about marrying this guy beforehand.  We all heard that he starts with the Jack Daniels or whatever at 10:00 a.m.

i will die in china one day from a domestic violence dispute, i'm quite certain of this, i have had 3 violent altercations like this already and dont go to any bars anymore, but one day in a shopping center or a public bus, im going to die defending a woman i dont know because i grew up with a stepfather that did this when i had no power to stop it, i pissed on his grave ten years ago at sunrise the day after his funeral, but as the roman legionnaire says, today is a good day to die and tomorrow will be better,  my only reward will be that i will definitely take a few with me when i go to the pits of hell and get my vip seat next to lucifer himself.

i would not let a woman get hit in front of me if it was a policeman with a loaded gun and my life insurance is paid in full. i dont expect the neanderthals in china to change their stripes and a subhuman animal is never going to change until the women have more power here.

Look at how grandparents jerk little kids around. If a kid is not walking in the correct direction they get at strong jerk by the arm. Showing what physical power does starts early in life. 

  I'm the same as ambivalentmace, I grew up around rather extreme domestic violence including four attempted murders believe it or not. I'd rather drink my own piss than walk by when a man is physically abusing a woman. I don't know the statistics regarding domestic abuse here though, but I imagine that women having a more second class citizen type status compared to back home doesn't help matters. 

Don't get me started with this. You step in and try to stop the guy from beating the woman, and then SHE starts attacking YOU, and she's calling YOU a foreign devil. Then the whole forking town joins in and tries to beat your ass.

The nerve of some people. Hiding the bodies is the hardest part about about it. Sheesh, it's really messy.