The earthquake in China is an act of nature but the tragedy is compounded by the work of humans. Obviously China is not as advance as the U.S., Japan and Europe and so the ability to react to disaster is not expected to be world class. Come to think of it, our response to Katrina was also less than world class. But some of the deaths in China certainly could and should have been avoided. The total collapse of some of the schools are inexcusable. These were buildings erected not that long ago and should have been built much better. The race to build more and to make more profits have been costly as businesses and the government cut corners. It is not just foreigners who have lack of confidence in goods made in China, even the Chinese suspect poor quality due to greed. China is like America during the Industrial Revolution where anything goes as long as profits are made. The Olympics venues will be world class but the average Chinese are still being treated as second class citizens
Add to the misery of the death of all of those children is the fact that most of them are an only child. Due to the one child policy in China most parents only have one child. Can you imagine the pain of losing a child, the only one you have? I understand the need to control the population of China but there are just too many negatives with this policy. Killing or abandoning of female infants is obviously a tragic consequence. The only child, especially a boy, becomes a child emperor. The spoiling of the only child will weaken the Chinese adults in the future. Also with greater number of boys than girls, many men will not be able to find a mate. This will possibly lead to increase in depression and alcohol and drug abuse among future men. With less children and lack of a social safety net, who will take care of the elderly in the future. These are all potential disasters as a result of the one child policy.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
2 comments:
Use the following html code to make a clickable link in your comment (instructions in the sidebar). You can test the link by previewing your comment.
<a href="http://angryyellowman.blogspot.com">Angry Yellow Man</a>
The above example will display as Angry Yellow Man
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
A certain newspaper also questioned the quality of the building structures to handle the 8.0Ms earthquake. That newspaper also used this opportunity to comment on and/or attack the QC of Chinese made products. The newspaper was in turn called STUPID. If you go to the states, the chances of their buildings to withstand an earthquake of that level is also questionable. Out of the many donations made so far, the amount made by the "advanced" U.S. is among the LEAST - Very classy.
ReplyDeleteObviously an 7.9 earthquake is going to cause enormous damage and lost of lives no matter what country it hits. Some of the school buildings were relatively new and should have been made better. They collapsed within seconds. Experts say that if they were decently built it would have given more time for the students to escape and perhaps save many of the lives. One of my first blog was critical of the response of the U.S. government to the Katrina disaster. Again level 5 hurricanes will cause enormous damage and lost of lives but better structures and response would have save lives.
ReplyDeleteThe cutting corner of some Chinese products are real. But to criticize China only is wrong. If I am contracting out to produce products with my name on it, shouldn't I be sure that the products are good? Ultimately it is the U.S. companies that are responsible for quality control. For example a toy was found to be have a design flaw. Yet this was blamed on China. Well, the design was done in the U.S. The workers in China just did what was told. So you are right in that it is despicable that newspapers use this opportunity to attack Chinese products.
I don't know how much the U.S. has donated to China for this tragedy. But the world is getting less and less dependent on the U.S. In future blogs I will write about how the U.S. is becoming less relevant to the world and other people will listen to us less. This I think will be more dangerous than terrorism.