Arthur Peabody

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/w...ike-share.html

'
As Bike-Sharing Brings Out Bad Manners, China Asks, What’s Wrong With Us?

McBTC

Don't post this on the LCF sub-forum or you may get a warning for trolling... they're pretty sensitive over there.

canklecat

Tragedy of the Commons. It's human nature for a common or shared resource to be exploited by a few users, ruining the experience for the many.

But it manifests differently in different cultures. Anyone with a family and children knows that shared resources demand continual and consistent management from a higher authority -- parents. At the macroeconomic level, shared resources work only within the framework of a balance between careful management by a higher authority (usually the government) and reasonable incentives that reward personal initiative without harming others in the system. As the linked article mentions, China's unique history and culture combine some of the most detrimental aspects that doom a responsible shared resource model to failure.

phoebeisis

Communist Revolution, when the famed writer Lu Xun assailed Chinese culture as selfish, boastful, servile and cruel.

In cultures where immediate FAMILY is everything
the natural corollary is everyone else is of no worth
This is why the Chinese are periodically embarrassed by videos showing toddlers run over and left in the street while adults walk by
Or when 250,000 chinese babies were poisoned by melamine adulterated baby formula
15 years earlier melamine adulterated pet food was shipped world wide
(melamine is a high in nitrogen industrial byproduct-crude protein assays test for N levels-
and the widely repeated "I hope it is an urban legend" that when chinese drivers hit a pedestrian-they back over him to make sure he/she is dead-cheaper to kill than to maim-

Daniel4

Actually, that originated during the days when Hong Kong was part of the British Empire with the British Servicemen stationed there. If one kills a local, he had to pay for the funeral. If one injures the victim, one has to care for him to recovery. So if it looks like permanent injuries, it's cheaper for the serviceman to make sure his victim is dead by running over him again until he's dead.

phoebeisis

Maybe- It does have an urban legend feel to it-BUT

the melamine in baby formula-and in pet food-widely reported in medical journals(the head of the chinese FDA equivalent was executed for evil doings 10 or so years ago)
So was the ethylene glycol sold as glycerine-that ended up killing over 100 folks in South America(Ven maybe-it-glycerine not anti-freeze- is a common carrier liquid for compound in Pharmacy cough syrups).
So was the substitution of Chondrotin sulfate for Low molecular weight heparin-1-2 years ago.
And China is moving into high end Pharm-MABs etc-imagine that!
And several years back a "bunch of foodies" lost their sense of taste for 6 monthsafter consuming Chinese "pine nuts"
Now why a human would eat a pine nut??
The above NOT urban legends-actual horror stories-except the foodies pine nuts-that is just "funny"



Peter Foster By Peter Foster, Beijing8:27AM BST 17 Oct 2011 CommentsComment
It is a story that has deeply unsettled millions in China, posing troubling questions about whether three decades of headlong economic development has left nothing but a moral vacuum in its wake.
It begins last Thursday when a two-year-old girl totters into a narrow lane in a wholesale market in the thriving industrial city of Foshan in Guangdong Province and is hit by a small, white van. The driver pauses, and then pulls away, crushing the child for a second time under his rear wheels.
It is not the accident itself, but what happens next — or rather doesn’t happen – that has left millions of ordinary Chinese wondering where their country is heading.
One by one, no fewer than 18 passers-by are seen on closed circuit television ignoring the girl as she lies, clearly visible in the road, haemorrhaging into the gutter. Not a single one of them stops to help.
The first is a young man in a white T-shirt and trainers. He walks on past the prone form of girl who is by now bleeding profusely, without a second glance.
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jefnvk

Chinese cities are starting to ban new bike shares because of these issues: Beijing bans new bikes as sharing schemes cause chaos - BBC News

Stadjer

They still don't trust their babymilk. My neighbour is Chinese and further down the street there's a university housing for often Chines post docs and PhD's whose girlfriends are usually bored. So these girls cycle around the city to buy boxes of babymilk powder, only one box per customer per store is allowed because of shortage, and about a full van a week is shipped to China. It's good business.

phoebeisis

Yikes-so expatriate Chinese are still shipping safe baby formula home-Groningen+Germany? Netherlands??

It-the scandal-broke in 2008-HUGE numbers-and god knows how long it had been going on.
China has a HUGE problem but greedy fools here-USA- will no doubt by high markup Pharm- products if the profit potential is there.
Pretty sure I already mentioned the fake LMWH-substituted chondrotin sulfate for heparin-
This is all recent-last 9 years-history.
The well educated Chinese students-safe bet they KNOW their fellow countrymen-if they still fear a product like baby formula-YIKES!
Who poisons their own people-just to make a few extra $$
In the 19th century in the USA- people sold "medicines" tonics patent medicines cure alls
But they never intentionally sold POISON
And their products-heavily laces with opium and alcohol
ACTUALLY WORKED- they relieved pain-dental old injuries old war wounds
Yeah those products worked-and were SAFER than going to a doctor-

Anyway-don't put anything that comes from China in your body

Stadjer

I don't know about Germany and I don't know if their fear is justified. The trust is usually gone much faster than it can be restored, it also might be a matter of status for upper middle class Chinese to feed their babies European milk. But it seems to me that it's just business for the expats and doubt if there's any real worry about the health of the next generation of Chinese.

Like in most former communist countries, corruption has stayed while the market has brought much more incentives to cheat and made a lot more money available for bribes. I don't think the West is free from corruption when it comes to food safety, but the corruption is more subtle in the legal and scientific area, allowing only mild poisons to get through.

phoebeisis

Stadjer
Thanks for your clarification.
I was trying toi guess where your location-Groningen-is.
Netherlands apparently?
But you are referring to a formerly communist country that now has significant numbers of Chinese Post Doc students?
So not sure where you are referring to.
Here in NOLA -1990's were were friends to many expat. Chinese Grad students-Loyola Tulane UNO
They were salt of the earth types-very good with our young son-some baby sat him to make $ while they or their husbands in school.
Hard to reconcile these expats. with the behavior of some of their countrymen.
The incidents-poisoning baby formula to get a few cents more per KILO(dry weight) by adding a toxic industrial byproduct-
Is BEYOND amoral
It is amoral
But it also indicates very little fear of getting caught?
Poison your OWN countrie's babies??? where would that NOT earn you a bullet in the head??

Yeah it is a puzzle-amoral and no fear of bullet in head
China executes people-perhaps percentage wise-more than USA-(guessing USA under 10/yr)
But these corrupt folks-no fear?

Slight aside
Is it China or Japan where people RENT fancy bottles of WINE BOOZE
They don't actually buy and drink it-they just sorta display it??
In USA many folks are into conspicuous consumption-
cars boats houses jewels clothes- fancy restaurants BOOZE
and they can rent all but the booze restaurants
Perhaps in the past -before USA had many many very affluent people-
USA-E-INS did rent FAKE BOTTLES OF BOOZE??

We-USA- did sell patent medicines-but they actually had some positive effects-opium=pain alcohol=sedative cocaine=stimulant might help asthma caffeine=stimlant might help asthma quinine=malaria
strichnine= stimulant(careful toxic)

And occasionally methanol ended up in home made booze-sometimes intentionally
the methanol in booze is the only clear case of adulterating a "food product" with poison to make a $$-
suspect methanol -
but that wasn't meant for BABIES!

Poisoning babies to make a bit more profit -WOW! just WOW