To my great distress, I further realized that the news commentary seemed to be attempting to downplay the evil so evidently displayed in the video.
It went something like this...
The Moral Vacuum.
Initially, commentators began to speculate that "perhaps Chinese morality has not kept pace with it's economic development." Referring to the fact that decades of Communism have now been supplanted by the pursuit of monetary gain, causing Chinese culture to come unhinged from any moral underpinnings.
"Perhaps"!?! What do you mean "perhaps"?! A toddler is run down and left to die like a dog in the street and the best you can come up with is "perhaps"?? As if to say "We can't say for sure, but maybe this should not have happened."
The Bystander Effect.
Next, the ghost of Kitty Genovese was conjured up as a soothing balm for our Western sensibilities. This particular line of reasoning states that when groups of people witness a traumatic event, there is a high probability that no one will come forward to intervene, preferring instead to wait for someone else in the group to make the first move. Sort of like a whole bunch of people second guessing themselves all at the same time.
The only problem is that the "Foshan 18" (as I call them) were not in a group. This is a huge difference that cannot possibly be understated. Each of those 18 people was confronted, individually, with a choice: to help or to keep walking. They all chose to keep walking.
So much for the bystander effect.
Any reasonably intelligent journalist should have been able to figure these things out. But did I see - even once - someone come out and say it was all b.s. - that none of these things fully explain what happened? No. Not once.
What does explain it (mostly) is a strong cultural aversion toward getting involved in other peoples business combined with:
The 'Nanking Judge'.
This refers to several recent cases in which accident victims successfully sued the Good Samaritans that came to their aid. Despite how completely twisted this sounds, it's true. The Nanking Judge ruled that, by helping an old woman who had been struck by a car, a Good Samaritan named Peng Yu had "acted contrary to common sense" and therefore must have been the person that caused the accident - presumably then acting out of guilt to try and correct the situation (why else would he have helped her?).
No doubt, then, the Nanking Judge would approve of the actions of the Foshan 18. Surely he must be able to watch the video and nod his head approvingly at the display of good common sense that is evident.
Peng Yu nearly lost everything he had (and he wasn't the last person this happened to) and still ended up paying something like 40,000 yuan.
So when you weigh the very real possibility of losing your entire life savings against the desire to help an injured person (or even a child) things start to look a little different.
In light of this I can almost (but not quite) let the Foshan 18 off the hook. It took an old woman who most likely has no access to the internet and therefore knew nothing about Peng Yu's highly publicized case, to intervene and try to save Wang Yeu's life.
For this reason, along with, and even more than, the Foshan 18, it is the Nanking Judge and, by extension, the government of China that bear full responsibility for the death of Wang Yeu.
As a Canadian, I am ashamed that my country continues to do business with such an evil, atheistic, morally bankrupt nation as China has now become.
