China's Good Samaritans count the cost of their altruism
Declining morals blamed for culture in which helpers often end up paying compensation
reddit this
Tania Branigan in Beijing
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 8 September 2011 17.44 BST
Article history
Nanjing: an elderly woman from the city who had fallen accused a bus driver who had stopped to help her of knocking her over and demanded money. Photograph: China Photos/Getty Images
China's Good Samaritans are weighing the cost of helping others after high-profile extortion attempts from people they have aided.
Commentators have blamed declining morals, high healthcare costs and inadequate laws for the scandals, warning that many people are now too scared to aid strangers for fear they will end up paying compensation or hospital fees.
In one widely reported case, an elderly woman who had fallen in Nanjing accused a bus driver who stopped to help of knocking her over and demanded money. He was cleared thanks to CCTV footage, reportedly prompting a run on video equipment in the area.
Fewer than 7% of 20,000 respondents in an online survey by Hong Kong-based Phoenix Television said they would stop while driving to offer help. More than 45% said they would turn a blind eye and 43% said they would help only if there was a camera.
Last week an 88-year-old man in Hubei died of suffocation due to a nose bleed after passers-by ignored his collapse. Only when relatives arrived, 90 minutes later, was he taken to hospital.
The soul-searching has been fuelled by new guidelines from the ministry of health, urging people to consider the circumstances before rushing to help old people who have fallen over. Officials stressed they were concerned about inappropriate treatment that could exacerbate injuries, but many saw it as a warning to helpers.
"What people need is apparently not technical guidelines, but the country and government's efforts to save morality, perfect the law, and promote social justice, fairness, economic development and income balance," wrote Liu Peng in a commentary on the People's Daily website.
An editorial in the Southern Metropolis Daily suggested that the government should set up a fund to pay for the medical treatment of old people if no one can tell who caused their accident.
Tan Fang, who has launched a foundation offering legal support to helpers who find themselves in trouble, warned: "Social morality has become imbalanced and has declined. There is also too much negative news, which makes the elderly tend to believe people who in fact help them are bad people, even though they might not remember clearly."
Tan, a professor at South China Normal University, added: "Governmental bodies need to promote a harmonious and moral atmosphere. Secondly, legislative bodies should investigate some cases and provide courts with correct guidelines. The third thing, I think, is to seek legal action against people who frame those who help them."
No one has been punished for fraudulent claims, in part perhaps because offenders are usually poor and elderly. Some may have been genuinely confused or simply desperate for money to cover medical fees.
In a 2009 paper on the phenomenon, anthropologist Yunxiang Yan pointed out that police and judges frequently demanded that the helper prove his innocence, while the extortionist was not required to provide witnesses or other evidence.
In one notorious case, a court ordered a Nanjing man to pay more than 45,000 yuan (£4,400) to an old lady whom he had taken to hospital. The judge argued it was common sense that he would not have gone to such trouble unless he had caused her fall.
"Gradually, helping a stranger is coming to be regarded as a mindless and silly act, instead of compassionate or heroic," noted Yan, of the University of California, Los Angeles.
He speculated that increasing social inequality might make the poor feel they needed the money more than their wealthier helpers. But he added that younger or middle-aged people were also more likely to help, because they tended to hold more universalistic moral values, while older people were more hostile to strangers and felt their duties were towards people within their social network.
