About the Peng Yu case has recently become quite popular online; you can find it anywhere if you search casually, so I won’t quote much here: “On September 5, the Gulou District Court in Nanjing delivered its ruling in the Peng Yu case, deciding that Peng Yu should compensate the plaintiff for 40% of her losses, amounting to 45,876 yuan. The judgment said, ‘From common sense, it is more likely that Peng Yu collided with the old woman. If Peng Yu had not knocked down the old woman, he would have had no need at all to send her to the hospital.’ Once the verdict was announced, public opinion across the country was in uproar, condemning the absurdity of the judgment and the decline of morality” http://view.news.qq.com/zt/2007/pyan/index.htm
The Peng Yu case, along with the behavior of the media and netizens surrounding it, reflects many problems. There is not much need to say about the judgment itself; clearly, it is a bad judgment. Even without looking at the content, just from the broad opposition it provoked, one can tell that this judgment was poorly delivered. It lacks both persuasive force and dignity.
Compared with the court, the media are no less childish. Almost all the major and minor media stood on Peng Yu’s side, and many discussions and criticisms took as their premise that Peng Yu was a good person who was falsely accused and had not actually hit anyone. But where did this judgment come from? In fact, even if we say the court ruled poorly, the problem is not that it reversed black and white; in fact, who is black and who is white is impossible to say clearly. One of Peng Yu and the old woman must be lying—why must it be the old woman who is lying? If the old woman did not lie, or if the old woman was merely muddle-headed and mistook the person, in short, if the old woman was also innocent and moreover a victim, then what? Such a huge public denunciation may not be able to recover the compensation awarded to the old woman, but the pressure of such public opinion is unbearable for anyone. Was the lesson from the recent “the most vicious stepmother in history” incident not enough for the media? Of course, the media will not learn a lesson; what they care about is only hype. They simply do not care how certain the facts actually are, and they never consider the spiritual devastation such hype inflicts on the people involved.
Compared with the court and the media, the childishness of the netizens who joined in the clamor is no less. Chinese people have always liked to watch from the sidelines and liked to join in the uproar. Very few people truly step forward when something happens; once someone takes the lead, many more follow suit in the shouting. That is the usual pattern. Whatever the media say is believed? Not only are people easily credulous, they are also easily excited, and they especially like to write sharp, mean, vulgar, sarcastic lines to vent everywhere. Of course, when the public becomes a “mass,” Le Bon was right: its childishness and excitability are perfectly normal. The problem still lies with the media.
Let us make a supposition: if the facts were really that Peng Yu knocked down the old woman, and when the old woman sued for money Peng Yu wanted to deny it, what kind of excuse could he possibly find? After thinking it over, perhaps the only defense would be to say that he was a bystander doing a good deed? Then, if someone had injured an old woman, sent her to the hospital, but was unwilling to pay the high medical bills, could such a situation exist? It seems entirely plausible as well. In other words, it is not impossible that Peng Yu was the one lying. At the very least, we cannot rule out the possibility that the old woman was merely an innocent victim (in fact, even if the old woman was speaking, she still first and foremost remains an innocent victim). If the situation was that an innocent old woman was knocked down by someone and did not receive a single cent of compensation, while the person who hit her instead became a hero for courageous righteous action and a dazzling star, would that not be even more wronged?
Here, the court’s judgment is difficult; sometimes the possibility of injustice is unavoidable.
Although one cannot guarantee one hundred percent accuracy, in any case the court’s judgment should strive as much as possible to be objective and rational, and should try to avoid being influenced by emotion. If this time the court were to change its ruling because of public opinion pressure, I think that would be even sadder—because in that case the court would be abandoning dignity and authority and submitting to popular emotion. Of course the court can change its ruling, but the premise must be that it provides reasons that hold together, and it must not be weak simply because of public pressure.
Of course, I do not think Peng Yu should be punished. Because although the court certainly has the right and indeed ought to infer according to “common sense,” another principle the court should follow can perhaps be classified as the principle of “presumption of innocence.” That is to say, when the evidence is insufficient, reasoning should lean toward the direction that the party concerned was not at fault, rather than toward inferring that the party concerned was at fault. And since the evidence here is unclear—otherwise there would be no need to invoke “common sense” to support the judgment—it should incline toward the judgment that the party concerned was not at fault. Such “common sense” is useful when an investigator is solving a case, but by itself it is not enough to convict.
But the problem is that this is a civil dispute rather than a criminal case, and the court needs to consider the rights and interests of both parties, so when the evidence is insufficient it is often common to punish both sides equally. However, the special thing about this case is its potential public impact, and that should be considered before the judgment, not after it.
From the fragments of the judgment posted online, this judgment is also clumsy in its narration, because it keeps insisting that Peng Yu really did hit someone, but the result is only to award a small portion of the compensation. This is obviously self-contradictory, and it is also an insult to Peng Yu—because since it cannot be completely determined that Peng Yu was one hundred percent responsible, then one cannot presume Peng Yu to be at fault. Even if Peng Yu is to be judged as bearing partial responsibility, the fact that the evidence in this case is insufficient should have been explicitly stated; “reason and sentiment presumption” cannot be used to replace “presumption of innocence.”
A better way to handle this case might perhaps have been: first of all, of course, to seek an out-of-court settlement; then to hold the third-party bus company responsible. Why did two No. 83 buses arrive at the same time? This was obviously caused by bus drivers competing for passengers. When I ride bus 783 in Shanghai, I often experience the scene of bus drivers racing after one another. And why was there such a lack of crowd control when the station had so many people, and so on? One cannot say the bus company had no responsibility here, because even if the old woman fell down without anyone knocking her, it was because she was rushing to catch the bus behind her, and that bus clearly stopped far too early, before the usual waiting area; or even if one says it was Peng Yu’s fault, the accident happened in front of the bus stop and still cannot be separated from the bus company. Even if one says the bus company was entirely without fault here, in civil compensation cases sometimes a party without fault can also be held liable. For example, in this case, if the old woman could not find the person who hit her at all, the losses she suffered could be recovered from the party responsible for the place where she fell, namely the bus company. Of course, such recovery might also have to be abandoned for lack of evidence, but if someone absolutely must pay compensation, punishing the bus company would be better than punishing Peng Yu.
But the clumsiness of this judgment seems to stem more from the court itself, especially its wording. As some people have analyzed online, this should not have been ruled that way according to the existing legal principles in China, and even according to the court’s own logic it does not hold together. In places with a more完善 legal system, there are inevitably many wrongful and distorted cases too, and it is not worth getting overly worked up to the point of making sweeping, politically charged denunciations. Of course, I do not object to netizens and young hotheads taking the opportunity to curse the system a bit (the media are equally worthy of cursing), but passion also needs calm; one must know that online abuse can affect the parties involved and can affect the judge, but it is hard to make any real impact on policy.
As for whether, once Peng Yu has been judged this way, nobody will dare to do good deeds anymore? Of course not. In fact, one does not even need the Peng Yu case: the “warning” that “you must be extremely careful around old men and women, because one wrong move can leave you with tens of thousands in medical bills, and if someone dies it becomes even more entangled” has long been common knowledge everywhere (at least I am very familiar with it). Fortunately this time no one died; if someone had died, it would have been even worse. Even without such a case, people already know this kind of risk. If, because they heard about the Peng Yu case, they no longer do good deeds, then when they first heard that “warning” they should already have obeyed it. The Peng Yu case merely confirmed what those “warnings” had said; at most it made some childish people wake up, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with the real-life Lei Fengs.
September 11, 2007
To kill someone, to convict someone, there must be evidence. In the absence of evidence sufficient to prove that Mr. Peng caused the accident, a judgment made on the basis of so-called common sense is inadequate. Moreover, Mr. Peng still had Mr. Chen as a witness proving his innocence. The court should have found Peng Yu not guilty, and the old woman’s medical expenses should have been borne by the polity.
If cases are not handled according to evidence, could one still, like the muddleheaded officials of the past, conduct cases by simply punishing both sides equally?
Gu Huo
2007-09-12 09:33:13 [Reply]
In this case the court indeed has a problem, but speaking strictly to the matter, this does not imply a problem with the entire polity (or rather, it can only imply a problem with the polity’s media). Even the most perfect legal system in a polity cannot avoid wrongful grievances; moreover, compared with many classic wrongful cases in the world, this case amounts to nothing much. The media and netizens’ excitement is utterly out of proportion! The public indeed needs passion, but that passion should be used elsewhere, not for abuse and mob uproar.
mist
2007-09-12 09:42:43 anonymous 124.17.16.85 [Reply]
If only the polity had provided a workable way to correct errors, but it didn’t.
This makes everyone feel insecure. Because people do not wait until disaster lands on their own heads before guarding against danger; they prepare from the very beginning. Since Peng Yu could receive such a judgment, who can guarantee that a similar judgment will not fall on one’s own head?
Indeed, strictly speaking, this case can only show that one part of the polity went wrong, but that part directly affected the entire polity’s reputation. People naturally infer that the same will be true in other parts of the polity. In academic reasoning, partial induction is invalid; but in everyday life, people often act on partial induction—for instance, going to some merchant after hearing only one or two recommendations from friends.
Gu Huo
2007-09-12 13:04:43 [Reply]
Of course there is a mechanism for correcting errors; the current judgment is only the first instance, right? I think we should not let media pressure interfere with the normal functioning of the error-correction mechanism. What if new evidence unfavorable to Peng Yu appears at the second instance? And the pressure of public opinion will be a huge interference for the judge. China’s trial mechanism may currently lack an element like a jury, but it does not need to rely on public opinion to intervene.
Will the entire polity’s reputation be affected by this case? Will this case make everyone feel insecure? I simply think such talk is too alarmist; this case was originally only so much. The more it is whipped up, the more it is called alarming, the more it may actually intensify the impact. Real-life Lei Fengs are not innocent little children; for a mature person, the risks of doing good deeds should already be understood. I think those who lacked such understanding before the Peng Yu case, yet lost confidence because of it, could never have been real Lei Fengs to begin with; their illusory confidence was bound to shatter sooner or later, and it does not hurt for it to shatter earlier. Because here it is not only a matter of system, but also a matter of human hearts. In this case it was the old woman who identified Peng Yu as the one who hit her. If Peng Yu truly did not hit anyone, then the problem here is that the other side bit the hand that fed her. Imagine that if the old woman’s family could also collude with some passersby to provide corroborating testimony, then even under a better legal system this case would probably still have resulted in Peng Yu being held responsible. Any mature person ought to have a sufficient estimate of the possibility of such vicious human nature; if one only wants to do good deeds on the condition that one can “guarantee a similar judgment will not fall on one’s own head,” then that person’s will is truly rather weak.
Helping an old person or a sick person out of kindness, only for the other party to die by your side by bad luck, and finally being extorted for a large sum by the family—stories like this have long since ceased to be news. At least I hear about them often, and am often “admonished” about them. The special thing about the Peng Yu case is merely that it was hyped by the media; in itself there is nothing particularly surprising about it.
Gu Huo
2007-09-12 13:38:32 [Reply]
“People naturally infer that the same will be true in other parts of the polity” is in fact quite normal. Not only are other parts of this polity like that, is this world not like that as well? Good deeds being rewarded has always been nothing but a fairy tale. If good people often do not get good rewards, then what is God for? Why discuss theodicy? Why did Kant insist on positing the postulates of practical reason? … Everything is because in reality good people often do not get good rewards. This is not a problem of the polity; it has always been the most basic problem of this shore-side world itself. Must we, as philosophy students, wait until we see the Peng Yu case before recognizing this?
mist
2007-09-12 17:05:44 anonymous 124.17.16.85 [Reply]
As for the Peng Yu case, it is best that we discuss only what is already known, and not bother with all the “what ifs.” Because if one wants to talk about all possible truths, then many situations are possible—of course Peng Yu hitting someone is one possibility, and this is also a possible truth: I took a plane all the way there that day, knocked down the old woman, and then, before anyone noticed, slipped away and came back, leaving Peng Yu to bear the injustice. A judge’s ruling can only be based on the current evidence, and not on all kinds of imagined “possibilities.” And whether he hit someone or not was never a matter of a 40% probability—he isn’t Schrödinger’s cat. What kind of absurd thing is compensating 40%? Doesn’t that mean 40% of hitting someone? Based on the current evidence, judging that Peng Yu hit someone is extremely mocking of the law.
“I think those who lacked such understanding before the Peng Yu case, yet lost confidence because of it, could never have been real Lei Fengs to begin with; their illusory confidence was bound to shatter sooner or later, and it does not hurt for it to shatter earlier.” This sentence can be changed as follows: “I think those who lacked such understanding in the face of public opinion, yet were disturbed by public opinion, could never have been good judges to begin with; their symbol of justice was bound to shatter sooner or later, and it does not hurt for it to shatter earlier.” In addition, the pressure a jury exerts on a judge seems no different from the effect of public opinion.
Not everyone’s will is strong enough, and not everyone can casually throw out 40,000 yuan as the price of doing a good deed.
If the polity on the one hand says it is building spiritual civilization, but on the other hand punishes behavior that conforms to spiritual civilization, then it is slapping itself in the face. Any consciousness is not born that intense; it has to be cultivated step by step. If helping others can never receive moral praise, and instead brings oneself spiritual and material loss, then most people cannot possibly be cultivated into the consciousness of helping others. The appearance of the Peng Yu case does nothing to help cultivate people’s consciousness of helping others. Because one function of morality is to induce people to do good and avoid evil; if everyone’s awareness were already very high, then what would morality be for? There are already many weak-willed people who have done good deeds or want to do good deeds; when they act, they may consider whether doing good would endanger themselves. For example, if someone falls into water, yet there are many onlookers nearby, that is because they worry about putting themselves in danger too—of course, one cannot rule out the possibility that they are merely there for the spectacle. —If possible, one might as well design such a question: “If helping a stranger to the hospital would result in you being fined 40,000 yuan, would you still help him?” Anyone who answers without hesitation that he would is not only strong-willed, he also has 40,000 yuan in assets.
Instances of good intentions being repaid with a dog bite have of course always existed, but why did the media not hype the earlier cases and instead hype the Peng Yu case? I do not know how to answer this question. Perhaps because the earlier cases had not risen to the level of a court judgment.
Positing the existence of God has a certain effect on moral life. It’s just that, compared with the happiness of the afterlife, I am more concerned with the welfare of this life—after all, this case happened in this life, and we also live in this life.
mist
2007-09-12 17:18:34 anonymous 124.17.16.85 [Reply]
Every polity will encounter the phenomenon of fraud; this is universal. But how it is handled differs from polity to polity. If one handles things only according to the evidence provided, wrongful and mistaken cases will naturally arise too—this is exactly the kind of film Teacher Liu Huajie once showed; but if not according to the evidence, then what can one base a judgment on? The extraordinary wisdom of the upright and impartial lord? A good system should be one in which, whether it is a clever person or a fool, the effects it produces should as much as possible be the same or similar. As the designer of the system, the polity cannot have no responsibility.
This is similar to choosing a political system: a good political system should be one in which, under that system, no matter who or which group is in power, the disturbance it brings to the whole social community should be as small as possible. By that standard, monarchy cannot count as a good political system, because the upheaval caused by Tang Taizong’s accession and Hitler’s rule is extremely massive.
If under one system a good judge in office can solve many wrongful and mistaken cases, while a bad judge in office will bring about wrongful and mistaken cases; then what do we need that system for?
weea f
2007-09-12 17:38:28 anonymous 59.41.84.215 [Reply]
I hope that next time that old woman falls down, she’ll just fall to her death, wasting state resources. The Communist Party serves the rich; we common people must rise up and resist. Didn’t Chairman Mao say, “Where there is oppression, there is resistance”? Today we’re being oppressed by the Communist bandits to the point we can’t take it anymore. We must resist!
The Internationale: Arise…….
Little friend
2007-09-12 18:15:19 anonymous 222.216.57.6 [Reply]
Alas, under our Chinese characteristics, what is this supposed to amount to….. It’s fine if netizens are a bit blind; at least they have some clout. The difference between Chinese people now and in the Republican era isn’t all that great either. They’re all the sort of people who cheer on by the side while watching someone else get beheaded. Do all 1.2 billion of us really have to know how to game things? That’s a bit too hard, isn’t it. Although the principle is very simple: today somebody else runs into this and you don’t help them; tomorrow it’s you who runs into it and gets no help. The domino effect has already taken shape. Raising the quality of the people is the key.
But a few days ago I read the law school’s opening address, and it made me very uncomfortable. Alas, our teacher Su Li began by talking about the difference between the petty bourgeoisie and the “shit” youth. Leaving aside the other characteristics, the petty bourgeoisie knows everything but never takes to the streets to demonstrate; the “furious youth” take to the streets to demonstrate, but don’t know why. Hehe, Professor, is this really worth bringing out and proudly showing off as evidence of your learning? Let some people who know nothing speak the truth of the world, while those who know everything, the petty bourgeoisie, do nothing at all. Is such a world really good? Even if this is the way of the world. Don’t expose our pure new students to it so quickly!! The “furious youth” I refer to above are foreign ones first; if they’re domestic, then they can only shout and holler in forums. I think that in the future, descriptions of the degree of democracy at home and abroad can simply use the different ways the “furious youth” curse people out to explain it.
Gǔ Diā
2007-09-12 21:52:31 [reply]
In response to Mist: // This sentence could be revised as: “I think those who, before public opinion, lack an understanding of this, yet are disturbed by public opinion, simply cannot be good judges. Their symbolic aura of impartiality will sooner or later shatter; there is no harm if it shatters sooner.” In addition, the pressure a jury exerts on a judge seems to differ in no way from the effect of public opinion. //
——
I agree with the sentence above, so I want to say, “If the court in this case changed the verdict because of pressure from public opinion, I think that is even more tragic.”
As for the role of the jury, there is an enormous difference between it and the effect of public opinion. First, the jury exerts influence before the verdict is delivered, and does not in the least damage the dignity of the judgment; second, the jury follows the entire trial process, participating relatively seriously and understanding the situation much more comprehensively, whereas public opinion spreads by hearing a bit and then running with it, and inevitably includes many people who merely follow the herd and stir things up.
About // a good system should be such that, whether it is used by wise people or foolish people, the effects it produces should be as identical or as close as possible //
——that is Kant’s ideal. Of course I also think this “ideal” sounds nice, but in reality it is impossible. A system is dead; how it is applied ultimately still depends on people. A thing without feelings, such as a computer, can achieve absolute “accuracy,” but it cannot adjudicate a case. No matter how good a system is, as long as it is operated by people, the possibility of errors cannot be avoided. The best approach is to reduce the likelihood of errors and to try to minimize the consequences of errors as much as possible; it is impossible to eliminate errors altogether. Moreover, even good judges and good systems can produce wrongful convictions and miscarriages of justice. The occurrence of a wrongful case itself cannot necessarily be blamed on the system, and it cannot necessarily be blamed on the judge either.
I want to ask: what exactly is the institutional defect embodied by the city-state in this matter? What the internet and the media have denounced in a torrent is nothing more than crying injustice and grievance, or biting mockery and sarcasm, but how many people have clearly explained where exactly the institutional defect in this case lies? If the reason is only: because a miscarriage of justice occurred, therefore the system is defective. Then that is the same as saying nothing at all, because real society is not a utopia; no system can possibly guarantee absolute perfection. If you are merely saying that the system must have some defect somewhere but you cannot pinpoint the crux of the matter, then that is only plain abuse and venting.
mist
2007-09-12 22:58:20 Anonymous 211.166.9.17 [reply]
I’m not sure what defects others have identified, but I roughly think the shortcomings of this case include:
1. Disregard for evidence, issuing a judgment when evidence is insufficient, especially rushing to decide when both sides stick to their own story yet neither can produce convincing proof;
2. Subjectivization of adjudication, especially this so-called reasoning, because different people may have different reasoning; thus if another judge, say those media people, were to handle it, they might reach the conclusion that the old woman was committing fraud;
3. The arbitrariness of sentencing. I really want to know where the 40% came from, just as I’m curious about why gravity is inversely proportional to the square of the distance rather than to 2.1 or some other number.
As for the so-called institutional defect, one aspect is that it cannot prevent this sort of shortcoming from appearing in adjudication, and after such a shortcoming appears, the system does not provide a workable remedy for correcting it.
Indeed, there is no workable error-correction scheme. You might look into those cases where people apply for state compensation and see whether what they lost and what they were compensated for are proportional, and then you’ll know.
Gǔ Diā
2007-09-12 23:35:48 [reply]
Regarding the shortcomings of this case itself, I only agree with your first point. As for the subjectivization of adjudication, that is not a defect, but merely a question of how to grasp the proper measure of subjectivity. Subjective factors in adjudication are unavoidable and need not be avoided; many times, judging a case is not only a matter of rigor, but also of discretionary judgment. The reason one needs a judge to preside over oral argument on the spot, rather than being able to judge the case merely from written requests and testimonial and material evidence, is in part because the subjective factor in human beings cannot be wholly discarded. If adjudication were just a matter of evidence, then the courtroom would lose its meaning. As for the standard for sentencing (actually compensation), there has never been a strict standard to begin with. The sentencing standards in ordinary laws are generally stated like this: for this crime, imprisonment of 3 to 5 years; under XXX circumstances, the punishment may be increased/decreased, and so on. Then exactly whether it is 3 years or 5 years—how can that be made clear? As for the 40% here, it isn’t especially strange either, because since it was a collision between two people, both people always bear some degree of responsibility. As for how much responsibility each should bear, that is up to discretionary adjudication; 40% and 60% are both possible. Asking why it is 40% is like asking why a criminal was sentenced to 4 years rather than 3 or 5—it really cannot be made clear.
This case is first instance, right? How can you say there is no error-correction scheme? Even if it were the final verdict, there would still be room for discussion. Of course, no matter what, the human and material resources consumed by litigation are far too great; that much is beyond dispute. But this problem is not very relevant to this matter. Moreover, even without considering litigation costs, in general, once a lawsuit is involved, even if you win, it is painful enough. No matter how good a system is, it cannot eliminate false accusations, can it? Otherwise, some other originally legitimate litigation claims would certainly have to be restricted as well. But if I make up some reasons and try every possible means to sue you, you are very likely to be summoned by the court, and even if you win the case, I bear the litigation costs or even get convicted of false accusation; but who will compensate you for the time you lost because of this? In short, no matter how good the system is, it cannot prevent the cruelty of human hearts from causing grievances and wrongs. As for expecting the system to avoid this kind of adjudication from happening, I think that is even more unrealistic fantasy.
Just a few words
2007-09-16 20:55:39 Anonymous 222.185.215.90 [reply]
I am a police officer, and I’ve handled many similar incidents (cases) in ordinary times. In many situations, the two parties each insist on their own version, and only they themselves know what really happened. The court’s verdict in such a case does look somewhat ridiculous, but who can know how it should be judged in order to count as just? Besides, this is only a civil lawsuit, not a criminal case where there can be no inference. If the court does not issue a judgment, then to whom should this ball be kicked? What is most heartbreaking now, I think, are the ideal utopians.
Gǔ Diā
2007-09-16 21:42:49 [reply]
Hehe~ I wrote about this topic precisely to see how many bricks I could draw out, and I didn’t expect even a police officer to show up. Truly a rare sight~~
Civil cases are indeed different from criminal cases; the key is not conviction and punishment, but mediation of disputes. Of course, the court always needs to emphasize fairness, but what counts as fairness? It’s easy enough to say in words, but very hard to grasp in practice.
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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