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Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

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Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#241

Post by AnthonyMouse »

Steltek wrote: post #227
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The language "accident" (and the associated story) implies that one cannot control whether they injure someone with their 2000lb death machines. That is not true. It's an accident because it's not on purpose. If you intentionally kill your ex with your car then people don't call it an accident. Moreover, there are less than 5000 pedestrian fatalities per year in the US, and the reason there are that many is that US…

Many (most?) accidents are predicated on a purposeful choice to drive dangerously: speeding and unable to slow down sufficiently, fiddling with your phone, driving drunk or tired. You may not mean to harm someone but American society has failed to recognize acts that directly contribute to injury and death.

> Many (most?) accidents are predicated on a purposeful choice to drive dangerously

"Dangerous" is one of those words that have been so abused it has lost all meaning. Infiltrating a violent criminal organization is dangerous. Explosive ordinance disposal is dangerous. Driving 11MPH over the speed limit is completely mundane.

It is obviously possible to drive very dangerously, but people also have a pretty good sense about these things and therefore don't. The number of people who are stupid enough to drive 120MPH in a residential neighborhood is small.

It is also true that e.g. driving faster can be, in a relativistic sense, "more dangerous" than driving slower. But that is true regardless of the point of reference. Driving 10MPH can be "more dangerous" than driving 5MPH. Driving 5MPH can be "more dangerous" than not driving at all. But that doesn't make driving 10MPH (or 40MPH) "dangerous" in an absolute sense. It just puts it in the same category of weighing costs against risks that government engineers do when deciding whether to build a sidewalk or catwalk or traffic light, or pedestrians do when deciding whether to cross at a blind intersection or walk to a different one. Each of which is a "direct cause" when a driver traveling at 40MPH hits a pedestrian crossing at a blind intersection with no traffic light.

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#242

Post by tertius »

gkanai wrote: post #159
chaostheory wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is spot on. There's a reason that people's last name comes before their first over there. It's a low trust society where the only thing that matters is your clan.

Last name first has nothing to do with trust. Japan is one of the highest-trust societies in the world (see crime stats) and last name comes first. I live in China and have lived 13 years in Japan so I know what I am talking about.

It's just a signal of a collectivist society.

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#243

Post by tertius »

developer1 wrote: post #208
guardiangod wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes it's sickening, and also broadly understood to be a logical thing to do in China. Let's play the devil's advocate and understand the motive behind it- The average annual wage of a Chinese citizen is $7,500 USD, whereas the average annual wage of an American is $45,000. Which means that $400,000 is worth 400,000 x 45,000 / 7,500 = $2,400,000 . And that's only over 23 years so far. You have to keep paying until the…

This. Frankly I don't understand these people who "don't get it". We're talking about the difference between moving on with your life with a guilty conscience, vs. having your entire life financially ruined due to injuring someone. I make $80k per year. If my country mandated > $100k per year for injuring someone, that's literally the rest of my life destroyed. I could not financially recover for the rest of my life.…

People are worth more than property.

Would I kill someone I don't know in order to save someone I know and love deeply? No. That is murder. Now saving a loved one vs. saving someone who is a stranger is a different scenario. The scenario depicted here is very clear. Kill or suffer loss of property that will impact your family physically.

I can see that this would be much harder to do in a collectivist society, I'll give you that much. But murder remains immoral.

I also agree that the consequence of injuring someone should be less. But I don't know what it's so high in the first place so I'm not at a point to really comment on that.

As an aside, I was not born in the U.S. and have lived the vast majority of my life in my country of origin. You stating that I would have the same perspective of those in China if I grew up there does not make that perspective the morally justifiable one. Not having grown up in that culture has given me (or most of us) the freedom of thought to come to the point where we can clearly identify it as immoral, even if we are never faced with the proposition.

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#244

Post by argklm »

When the state only thinks about money, people will turn into objects. The population will start to see other humans less valuable than their dinner table and will do their best to exploit them. If you go to China you will see beautiful landscapes, the lineage of one of the most advanced cultures and you will see the pain and the loneliness of its inhabitants. The rest of the world didn't cure the infection in time and now has grown to necrosis at the point that sociopathy it's the norm rather than the exception.

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#245

Post by studentrob »

malkia wrote: post #24
znt wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's in the book Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell. More info: http://blogs.wsj.com/middleseat/2008/12/04/malcolm-gladwell-...

Thank you! Yes, I believe this was the original article, but I've never bothered to read the book. Maybe I should! Edit: From the last comment found this article - which goes a bit against Malcolm Gladwell's findings - interesting read indeed - http://askakorean.blogspot.kr/2013/07/culturalism-gladwell-a...

Gladwell is definitely hand-wavy. I think this article's most compelling point is that Gladwell apparently did not ask a person of Korean culture to interpret the copilot's speech. In particular, one wonders, were the copilot's warning of adverse weather put lightly? Or did Gladwell misinterpret this man's usage of English language + Korean culture which, while seemingly more polite, may have different signals for urgency?

I work in Taiwan and disagreeing with the boss, while unpopular everywhere, is certainly less tolerated here than my experience in the west (east coast US). So Gladwell's story is compelling and built on a known difference in cultures. Yet, as usual, he is missing some facts to make his case.

The real question is, how is the airline performing now after the culture change brought in by the "western professor" as noted in the above comment by malkia? Are they still operating with his suggestions and have they been operating more smoothly? How do employees there feel about the change?

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#246

Post by sukruh »

sandworm101 wrote: post #49

Forgetting the laws, what sort of people can so casually kill like this? There are basic human instincts not to hurt people. Armies have to train soldiers to ignore these feelings because without training most won't kill even under combat situations. So when I see someone kill so casually I have to believe that they have rehearsed the scenario in their head beforehand. That means a large number of chinese people driv…

Psychopaths with incentives. Like as you said, people normally don't kill others, even when heavily incentivised to do so. In this case, the laws provided perverse incentives, and in a country with so many people, it is not surprising that psychopaths are involved in traffic accidents every day.

Interpreting this as somehow about Chinese culture etc. seems to be over the top IMO. Sure that law is bad, but other than that, there is no news here.

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#247

Post by ant6n »

Qantourisc wrote: post #179
sandworm101 wrote: post #49

Forgetting the laws, what sort of people can so casually kill like this? There are basic human instincts not to hurt people. Armies have to train soldiers to ignore these feelings because without training most won't kill even under combat situations. So when I see someone kill so casually I have to believe that they have rehearsed the scenario in their head beforehand. That means a large number of chinese people driv…

In this case it's kill or get your life ruined/killed/become a slave to your debt. The solution is rather simple though: make killing more expensive then injury. Best solution would be to reduce the cost of injury, and chuck the rest up to socialism. But it looks like communism China doesn't know socialism ?

You mean it's 'murder' or 'take responsibility for your actions'

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#248

Post by kelukelugames »

robgibbons wrote: post #240
kelukelugames wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is very hard for us to come in the US. Things are better and safer here. When I got here I discovered that people travel to poor and unsafe countries for fun.

I see your point now. I guess most travelers just want to learn more about the people and cultures of other places. One of the common criticisms of US citizens is that they are ignorant of the world outside of US borders. I would argue there's no better way to learn about the world than to travel to places outside of your comfort zone.

Do people really travel outside of their comfort zone?

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#249

Post by k4renio »

studentrob wrote: post #235
k4renio wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The video shows educated people probably around the Beijing university that is not really representative of what is really going on. 99% of the population is oblivious and brain washed. They have really no idea about the tiananmen massacre.

You're right the general public really doesn't know. Sorry, I generalized in my previous comment. Would you agree that the reason that the general public does not know is because the interviewed folks have been censored and self censored?

Yes it is censored ship but it goes beyond banned interviews, they filter all information. I think the most effective tool is selective teaching in school. Whole blocks of history are being ignored or re-written. The history teaching emphasise on how China has been bullied by the whole world in order to seed patriotism, while numerous TV shows and movies make sure to keep those memories fresh.

Re: Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit

#250

Post by studentrob »

k4renio wrote: post #249
studentrob wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right the general public really doesn't know. Sorry, I generalized in my previous comment. Would you agree that the reason that the general public does not know is because the interviewed folks have been censored and self censored?

Yes it is censored ship but it goes beyond banned interviews, they filter all information. I think the most effective tool is selective teaching in school. Whole blocks of history are being ignored or re-written. The history teaching emphasise on how China has been bullied by the whole world in order to seed patriotism, while numerous TV shows and movies make sure to keep those memories fresh.

Gotcha. In defense of their government, which I will almost never ever do, I don't know whether China historically got a fair shake or not. The Japanese, for example, never did say sorry for WW II and Nanjing. At least China didn't lose !

I imagine things haven't been completely fair for China, but that's life and everyone's pretty much in the same boat. I'm sure you will agree that teaching your citizens to distrust the rest of the world doesn't seem practical in today's global society. China, 中國, is no longer "the middle", it is one of many.

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