After toddler is left to die, China disquieted

[shemp]

After toddler is left to die, China disquieted

The video from Foshan City of Guangdong Province in China is unequivocal: A two-year-old is seen lying in a pool of blood on a market street having just been hit by a truck, which sped away after slowly running over her with its back wheels too, after which more than a dozen people walk around the toddler, non offering help.


The child, named Yueyue, survived the accident, after a 56-year-old rag collector finally came to her rescue and dragged her out of the road, but not before a second truck hit the girl, according to China Daily. She is now, however, in rough shape - "brain dead," doctors say - and is unlikely to survive.

I dug further and found more:

Chinese toddler run over twice after being left on street

It is a story that has deeply unsettled millions in China, posing troubling questions about whether three decades of headlong economic development has left nothing but a moral vacuum in its wake.

It begins last Thursday when a two-year-old girl totters into a narrow lane in a wholesale market in the thriving industrial city of Foshan in Guangdong Province and is hit by a small, white van. The driver pauses, and then pulls away, crushing the child for a second time under his rear wheels.

It is not the accident itself, but what happens next — or rather doesn’t happen – that has left millions of ordinary Chinese wondering where their country is heading.

One by one, no fewer than 18 passers-by are seen on closed circuit television ignoring the girl as she lies, clearly visible in the road, haemorrhaging into the gutter. Not a single one of them stops to help.

Before anyone generalizes this into negative comments about China or the effects of rampant capitalism (the Chinese themselves seem to be doing a good job of that already), you might want to read about the Bystander Effect. This is a classic case of it, and is already cited on that page.

 

[commandlinegamer]

I read about this yesterday and comments from Chinese people (not necessarily those involved) were along the lines of being afraid to help because of perceived negative consequences. Desperately sad state of affairs, if accurate.

 

[Beady]

I read about this yesterday and comments from Chinese people (not necessarily those involved) were along the lines of being afraid to help because of perceived negative consequences. Desperately sad state of affairs, if accurate.

This is the reason for the various state Good Samaritan Laws around the U.S., so it's not an unfounded concern. The incident in China, however, appears a bit extreme.

Speculation: I wonder how much of a role might have been played by the Chinese one-child law(s) and the Chinese preference for male children?

 

[casebro]

Do who and where was the caretaker? Mom throw the girl under the truck and walk away?

And where in Chinese culture does the 'don't get involved' meme come from? Watching too many American lawyer shows on TV? I can't believe it Karmic / Confusian.

 

[Scott Haley]

Nanjing Judge

And where in Chinese culture does the 'don't get involved' meme come from? Watching too many American lawyer shows on TV? I can't believe it Karmic / Confusian.

From the CBS news article:

According to many internet commentators, the relatively new tendency in China to ignore those in desperate need can be blamed on the "Nanjing judge."

Chinese news aggregator Chinasmack.com writes that phrase refers to "the 2006 case of a man named Peng Yu who helped a woman to the hospital after she had fallen only to have the old woman accuse him of knocking her down. The Nanjing judge in that case ultimately ruled that common sense dictated that only the person who hit her would take her to the hospital."

When you have no civil rights, it's best when the government doesn't notice you.

 

[bluesjnr]

Do who and where was the caretaker? Mom throw the girl under the truck and walk away?

The video is here. Be warned! It is potentially upsetting & NSFW. This is a link to the video and not a joke, it is extremely graphic. You click this link at your own risk.

My first thought was the Chinese "one child" rules and the preference for males. The child is soundly ignored by those that pass her by quite closely. I don't know if she'd be instantly recognised as a female but this video highlights something fundamentally wrong with a society that would walk by a poor wee bundle like that.

As for the driver the bastard runs her over then stops with her between the wheels only to pause then wheelspin over her with the rear wheels leaving a trail of blood. It's conceivable that he didn't see her initially but to carry on without checking what it was he/she run over beggars belief

 

[Abooga]

I´ve never seen anything more horrible than this. I whish I could unsee it.

 

[McHrozni]

Before anyone generalizes this into negative comments about China or the effects of rampant capitalism (the Chinese themselves seem to be doing a good job of that already), you might want to read about the Bystander Effect. This is a classic case of it, and is already cited on that page.

I'm afraid that bystander effect doesn't really explain this case. The video clearly shows a number of people walking by one by one, with intervals between them. The bystander effect shows that a group of people is less likely to act than an individual.

McHrozni

 

[bluesjnr]

I´ve never seen anything more horrible than this. I whish I could unsee it.

My thoughts exactly, it gave me such a feeling of helplessness and then rage.

 

[NoahFence]

Between Japanese whaling and total disregard for life that China shows, how can we not paint the region with the same brush? It's pretty clear they don't care about life of any kind.

 

[Foolmewunz]

Between Japanese whaling and total disregard for life that China shows, how can we not paint the region with the same brush? It's pretty clear they don't care about life of any kind.

Whoa! This is even known in the west because the blogosphere, and Chinese Twitter and social media in China is in a collective uproar over it. Will the wailing, gnashing of teeth and beating of breasts change the country? I doubt it. Might it cause a few people to examine themselves a little more closely, I hope so.

I work in an office of about 700 people. 700 of us were talking about this today, mostly with the same sort of disgust that's being expressed here. Hong Kong Chinese like to distinguish themselves from their mainland cousins normally, but today I saw a different element - they were accepting almost a national blame for this. There was much heated discussion and one guy got a bloody nose for saying something callous (in Cantonese so I didn't get the whole of it but he was trying to shrug it off as though it didn't matter). A bunch of guys sitting around in the lunch room in heated conversation, and one guy pops the other. I have never seen that in my office here in 10 years.

 

[Psi Baba]

For a culture that advocates bear farming and adding hazardous chemicals to consumer products this doesn't surprise me. I bet the people who ignored her probably just figured in another year or two she'd just end up in a sweat shop anyway (and she likely would have). My question is why were the parents so far away from her that they were not aware of what was going on?

Mrs Chen, who is only 4ft 7in tall, then calls for the girl’s mother who comes rushing into view, taking up her child in her arms, who is now in intensive care in the military hospital in the city of Guangzhou.

The mother was obviously nearby, but didn't know there was a child--her own child, no less--run over in the street! WTF?

 

[Foster Zygote]

Between Japanese whaling and total disregard for life that China shows, how can we not paint the region with the same brush? It's pretty clear they don't care about life of any kind.

They?

 

[Lamuella]

wow. Whole lot of judging of a billion people based on one incident in this thread.

 

[Mark6]

NVM. Here is more:

http://www.gzstuff.com/forum/topics/explaining-chinese-kindness

After four trials, a Nanjing judge ruled that since he admitted to being the first person to get off the bus, and in accordance with common sense, there was a greater probability that he had run into the old woman, and so he was ordered to compensate her over 45,000 RMB. This was a very famous case, often to explain why many people are reluctant to help others.

 

[NoahFence]

wow. Whole lot of judging of a billion people based on one incident in this thread.

One incident?

 

[Lamuella]

One incident?

one specific incident has been mentioned in this thread, and on the basis of that people have made an awful lot of generalized statements about China.

You went one further and made generalized statements about "they" and "the region", because clearly tarring 1.3 billion people with the same brush wasn't quite enough for you.

 

[NoahFence]

one specific incident has been mentioned in this thread, and on the basis of that people have made an awful lot of generalized statements about China.

You went one further and made generalized statements about "they" and "the region", because clearly tarring 1.3 billion people with the same brush wasn't quite enough for you.

Fine. I'll drop the culture thing in this thread - but the statement remains, and remains true until THEY prove they actually have a heart.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I wonder if the bystanders thought the driver of the truck was somebody important, or a relative? From what I've read there's a lot of problems with stuff like that in China--the children of officials can get away with crimes sometimes and ordinary people who try to stop them wind up getting in trouble.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Fine. I'll drop the culture thing in this thread - but the statement remains, and remains true until THEY prove they actually have a heart.

At least we needn't bother challenging you to prove you're not an idiot.