Eric's Beijing Diary

I was coming back from my Chinese class this morning, when I saw an accident. A guy on one of those motorized bicycle rickshaws came screaming through an intersection and hit a lady on a bicycle. He looked back briefly to see her sprawled on the pavement, and then kept right on going. Pig. I stopped and helped her up. Fortunately, she didn't seem to be badly hurt. But still, the guy should have stopped. I don't know, really, who's fault it was, except that the guy was going much too fast. But his attitude really bothered me. I guess it's because I see too much of it. It doesn't surprise me that women in China tend to like America better. But I don't want to generalize about men. I have come to know lots of decent men in this country. And I should not generalize about hit-and-run accidents based on one incident. I was hit by a hit-and-run driver when I was a kid in Japan. The driver happened to be a woman. A couple of truck drivers who saw the accident were horrified by her actions, and took down her license number. I managed to limp home. I was injured, but not permanently (there's some debate about that), so I didn't see any point in pressing the matter.

But getting back to my original point...it's not fair to make a statement about all men in China based on this one disgusting display. But I do think it is appropriate to consider the way women are treated in China. I am not a feminist. I don't evaluate way women are treated by counting the number of female CEO's. Stuff like common courtesy and deference are much more important, I think.

Labels: Women