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Human apathy can kill a person, too

(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-12-18 07:53

After postgraduate student Yang Yuanyuan committed suicide because a Shanghai university refused to provide accommodation to her mother, many people have blamed poverty for the tragedy. But it seems human apathy is more to blame, says an article in Huangshang Morning News. Excerpts:

Yang Yuanyuan might have been an excellent example of persistence and triumph had she not committed suicide. As a poor girl who lost her father while she was still an infant, she surely had achieved a lot by qualifying for a postgraduate seat in a university.

Hence, it is not right to attribute her tragedy only to poverty. She had struggled throughout her life but never given up. So why did she break down suddenly? Despair and fear of a bleak future, perhaps. But she knew that even postgraduate degree holders found it hard to land a proper job.

It is not only poverty that drives people to suicide. Human apathy, too, could kill. The sense of not being cared for can be more painful than financial difficulties.

A debate has been raging in the media over whether the university should be held responsible for Yang's death. She was really not asking a lot by requesting the university to provide lodging facilities for her mother, too. That is an example of filial piety, for long a virtue of Chinese society.

Her university may have been legally right to turn down her request, but society expects more from an institution of higher learning. As our ancient thinkers have said, educational institutions should not only assume the role of money-makers, but also shoulder the responsibility of the nation's' moral-building.

In this epoch of low morals, suicide has become a familiar word. But when apathy and lack of concern claim a life in the sacred temple of education, it is high time we gave the problems facing our society today a more serious thought.

(China Daily 12/18/2009 page9)