Editors Note: On October 13th, in Foshan (a city in Guangdong Province), a 2-year old girl (Tong Yueyue), wandered out into the middle of the road in a hardware market, where she was ran-over by a van (both its front and rear wheel). Soon after that vehicle drove away, a second vehicle ran-over the girl a second time. In the next seven minutes, 18 pedestrians walked by, with an apparent cold indifference to the horrific scene. Finally, an old scrap peddler moved the small girl's body to the side of the road, where her mother found her moments later. They were taken to the Guangzhou Military General Hospital's intensive care unit, where after a week, she passed away on October 21st at 12:32.The Legal Daily, the newspaper published by the PRC Ministry of Justice, recently conducted a survey entitled “How do you view the Tong Yueyue incident?”, which asked 4,677 people to give insight into why these 18 people refused to acknowledge or help the small dying girl. The survey results are listed below:

1) 18 people passed by the little girl and none of them stopped to help her. What do you think was going through their minds?
- Afraid to assume any sort of responsibility in the matter	53.61%	2,336 votes
- Wanted to avoid any trouble	44.76%	1,950 votes
- They didn't realise what had happened	1.63%	71 Votes
2) Everyone is hotly debating the morality of these pedestrians who ignored the girl. Yet, the famous Peng Yu Trial*, where a well-intentioned man who came to someone’s aid was falsely accused of harming them and was punished for it shows the consequences of helping. Confronted with such a situation, how should we react?
- Report the incident, but don’t physically help	66.19%	2,884 votes
- Help regardless of the consequences	21.46%	935 votes
- Get out of there as fast as possible	12.35%	538 votes
3) Should there be a law that requires people to help (and punishes them for refusing to help) in these types of situations?
- It would be difficult to create such a law	49.97%	2177 votes
- Yes	34.08%	1,485 votes
- No	15.05%	695 votes
4) What is the root cause of this increasingly frequent phenomenon of people refusing to help when someone is in need?
- Moral decline	42.39%	1,847 votes
- It’s complicated	29.24%	1274 votes
- Gaps in the law	28.37%	1236 votes

*In 2006, Peng Yu brought a woman to the hospital after she fell down. Despite this noble act, the old woman accused him of knocking her down. A judge in Nanjing ruled in the woman’s favour, stating that common sense dictated that only the person who hit the victim would take her to the hospital. This case set a negative precedent against helping injured people in need, as there is no legal protection in China for the Good Samaritan.

Source: sohu
 

Related links
Help Thy Neighbour: Explaining Civic Apathy in China
Causes and Social Consciousness: Does China Lack Both?
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