What does it tell us about Chinese culture and society that, according to an article on Slate, drivers in China ensure that they kill people who they hit?

This tells us nothing about China, but it tell us that having a proper healthcare system is a very good idea for a society to live with decency and peace.

I remember reading a Chinese book few years ago with a similar story : In a Chinese rural area, a guy walking on the street witness someone being hit by a car that quickly run away. Our guy run to check on the person lying on the ground, and find out a young farmer apparently badly wounded. He decides to bring him to the hospital. While carrying him on his back in the night, he figures out that he may have to pay for all the expenses - a poor farmer surely doesn ‘t have an insurance. Now, he has to chose : pay for this unknown guy or go back to his ‘normal ‘ life and send his son to a good school. How will he explain to his wife that he took years of hardly earned money to care for a random person in the street ?

So, what will you do in the same situation in the US ? Will you care for this person if you know you may be liable for all care costs ?

I am not saying that it is anything normal to kill 4 years-old because of money, but honestly I find your question and all the debate around this article outrageous. Instead of trying to get judgmental about what it said about the “Chinese “ and their culture, we better ask ourselves what it said about the modern “society “ WE have built. There is nothing about Chinese culture here. You should stop seeing China as some sort of remote weird culture. Like in the US or Europe, basic social norms like mutual aid and care don ‘t exist anymore. You don ‘t help others because it may be dangerous for you. The current thing is all about competition, survival and “you deserve what you get “ by so-called hard work. As long as we will entertain such discourse globally, people will be daily pushed to their most degrading limits and such things will keep happening.

This text was originally published in quora.