<p>Previous studies have focused on significant social and historical events, considering the construction of cultural trauma as a process of negotiation and contestation. This paper applies cultural trauma theory to analyze a micro-level gender conflict incident. Based on an internet ethnography of the assault incident at a barbecue restaurant in Tangshan, China, it finds that the female group used the gender violence narrative to construct the incident as gender trauma, rapidly broadening the collective identity. However, this narrative was quickly suppressed and deconstructed by the eliminating darkness and evil narrative. The narrative control gradually shifted from the gender group to the state power institutions, which transformed gender trauma into national trauma. Finally, it argues that the shift in narrative is an influence of cultural structure. A narrative needs to align with the cultural structure, with structural stability and continuity of meaning, to succeed.</p>