Teachers always told us that pointing out our false were their duty to be a teacher when we still in primary school or middle school. Parents, too, always told us showing their anger to our false or telling what was right was their duty. What they both did for their students and children were their duties of education, constant guidance and nurturing for their better futures. The process, however, might not be easy for children to realize their parental love and teachers’ educational roles since they may at times come in the form of anger or harsh criticism.
However, it must be noted their anger or criticism is not the one for the anger or criticism itself. It’s for purpose and reason. It instead should be understood as joys, upsets, laughter, tears, wishes, dreams, etc. most parents and teachers share with their children and students throughout their lives and the period of education.
This is how we grow up with a balanced or harmonized mind towards others so that we could become a responsible social being for greater communities such as the society, the nation and, furthermore, the world than the home and the school. To become a responsible social being, the critique is a something must-go-through-thing throughout one’s life. Critiques might be too difficult to accept sometimes but it is something one should be able to go through for growth and continued improvements.
The collapse of bridges and the buildings are too frequent to be seen these days. Especially the latest crash of two bullet trains in Zhejiang province caused 39 deaths. China seems have bad luck. Too much sad news to the public tested the tolerance of the people. Facing lag reactions by the relative departments and lacking information about why tragic incidents took place, the public turn upset to anger, and show their feelings posting onto the websites.
Gossips of the “7·23” accident flooded on the website. The provided information by the Ministry of Railways made public outrageous instead. It seemed to even have made them to further lose their trust in the government. Their anger was even further inflated due to the ministry’s poor performance of crisis management. It was the public who tried to filter out the truth from the all sorts of rumors instead the traditional media who didn’t fulfill their duties and roles they supposed to play.
Getting information daily from the news media which is filled with so many serious social issues, the public in China seem very upset and angered too often. The social issues, such as food safety, gaps between rich and poor, corruption in the government officials, etc., have caused public’s distrusts and critiques in the government, not necessarily the relative ministries.
However, at the same time, the repeated tragedies and public’s uncontrolled angry reactions make many concerned about the stability of the nation in the long run. It seems there are huge gaps to be filled between the government and the public in their respective understandings and expectations. No matter how hard they (the government) work, unless appropriate, true and timely information are provided to the public, misunderstandings and mistrusts could be further deepened.
China, as a developing country, not only needs to raise people’s living standards but also to improve their institutionalized effectiveness to deal with urgent social issues during the time of crises. It seems the timely provided true information is one of the key areas to be corrected. It seems both in the government and the society in general there are severe shortages of necessary experiences, know-how, knowledge how to react and handle after the incident or even prevent those emergencies from taking place in the first place. Furthermore, the legislative body, too, seemingly could hardly come up with new and badly needed laws and regulations in order to restrict those misconducts before they take place.
The central government is bombarded by challenges from everywhere.
The recent public anger and distastes toward the government shouldn’t be taken as dilemma for the government. Rather the public anger should be taken something in the service of the nation, i.e., the government, and even considered as their partners to work and solve and tackle together the evermore challenging social problems.
By listening to the anger of public, the government should be able to find a number of helpful ways and means to solve many difficulties both the nation and the people face. Public’s anger as their love and responsibilities for the nation should be regarded like a lighthouse for the government.
Yang Jingmin is an editor of M4.cn and can be reached at jingmin_yang@yahoo.cn
And should also thank the cheif editor of M4.cn, the articles cannot be posted without his help.