A little while ago I saw a piece of news online saying that five poor college students in Xiangfan had their funding canceled because they were “ungrateful.” Today I happened to see a follow-up report on TV, and I can’t help writing a few words.
At first, when I heard the two words “ungrateful,” I thought: just how badly had they behaved, and how much embarrassment had they caused the benefactors, that those female entrepreneurs would angrily give up their sponsorship? But after watching for a long time, I found it was only that after receiving the money they never took the initiative to write letters or make phone calls to the benefactors. Just for this, it’s called ungrateful? By contrast, the moral character of those benefactors is what truly makes one indignant.
“19 female entrepreneurs formed pairs with 22 poor college students for sponsorship, with each person receiving between 1,000 and 3,000 yuan per year for four years” — what a tremendous favor that is!? — entrepreneurs? For an entrepreneur, what is 3,000 yuan a year? I took 20,000 yuan and speculated in stocks, and in one month I made back 3,000 yuan. Not to mention that for an en-tre-pre-neur, what can 3,000 yuan possibly count for? You pinch half a grain of sugar out of your teeth and hand it to someone, and then expect them to be moved to tears with gratitude? Of course, those 3,000 yuan are not a trivial sum for the very poorest students, and those female entrepreneurs plainly seemed to be counting on exactly that, thinking that by spending only a small fraction they could get a taste of being philanthropists. But doing it this way would be worse than playing tricks with monkeys. Although monkeys don’t write thank-you letters, if you give a monkey a few bananas, it can still act coy toward you; wouldn’t that be even better? But even monkeys have moments when they won’t buy it, let alone poor students?
The female entrepreneur on TV said that when they give aid, they do not hope to get fame and benefit in return — of course I believe that, because 3,000 yuan is originally just loose change for an entrepreneur, something one can round away when calculating investment returns, and naturally there is no need to expect any return in fame or profit. In my view, the purpose of those entrepreneurs who demand “gratitude” in their giving is easy to state: it is “playing with monkeys,” just like raising a pet — I give you a bit of tasty food, and you give me some coyness and a little performance; that is probably the mentality.
The female entrepreneur on TV made a comparison, saying that when you give up your seat on a trolley bus, it is only natural for the other person to say thank you. That is certainly not wrong, but what does that have to do with this matter? First, giving up your seat to the elderly, the weak, the sick, and the disabled is itself a natural thing; one could even say that giving up your seat is only right and proper. The naturalness of giving up a seat and the naturalness of saying thank you make the whole process of seat-giving something natural, that is to say, in fact the whole matter has become a kind of etiquette, a kind of habit. Here, the thank-you of the seat recipient is not so much out of “gratitude” as out of politeness. To be able to cite giving up a seat as an example to explain gratitude shows that in that female entrepreneur’s mind, even a small matter as right and proper as giving up a seat counts as a kind of “bestowing favor.” Should one then, after being given a seat, write the person a thank-you letter as well? Or should we look at how bus companies set up special seats for the elderly, the weak, the sick, and the disabled on every vehicle — are all the elderly, weak, sick, and disabled supposed to express gratitude to the bus company?
In fact, the two sides in the seat-giving situation are equal in status, or rather, conversely, the one giving up the seat may be doing so out of respect for the elderly, not out of pity for the weak. In the relation between giving and receiving, neither side should have a sense of superiority. But sponsoring poor students is not the same as giving up a seat to the elderly, the weak, the sick, and the disabled; the former is not a naturally self-evident thing, and in a certain sense one really can say that sponsoring is a kind of “bestowing favor.” Precisely because of this, precisely because this is a virtue, it should even less demand “gratitude.” For once one speaks of bestowing favor and gratitude, the status of the two sides becomes unequal: the benefactor acquires a certain sense of superiority, while the recipient inevitably acquires a certain sense of inferiority — of course, it would be best if neither feeling were present. Yet the female entrepreneurs’ demands that poor students write letters, make phone calls, sing and dance at friendship gatherings, and so on, are clearly reinforcing their own sense of superiority and the other side’s sense of inferiority; such demands are shameful.
Charitable activities have, since ancient times, been divided into two kinds: one is a genuine giving that comes from the heart, and the other is a game in which the rich treat the poor as playthings to satisfy their own psychology of superiority. The boundary between these two kinds of charity is not clear-cut; the former can at any moment degenerate into the latter. Clearly, those few female entrepreneurs are in the process of proving to us that they belong to the latter kind.
I seem to remember seeing some philosopher — probably an ancient Greek one — say that bestowing favor can be divided into four kinds. The first is when neither the benefactor nor the beneficiary knows about it; this is the best. The second is when the benefactor knows the beneficiary but the beneficiary does not know the benefactor; this is also the noblest. The third is when the beneficiary knows the benefactor but the benefactor does not know the beneficiary; this is also not bad. Finally, when both benefactor and beneficiary know each other, but the favor is given without seeking repayment, that is only barely passable. At the time I didn’t think much of it either (and so I didn’t remember it firmly; I only recalled it in broad outline), but now those words come back to me, and they really were well said. It seems those female entrepreneurs have far from imagined reaching such a state.
On another level, “bestowing favor” is not necessarily a virtue; the same act of giving may be either doing good or something extremely vile. The ancients long ago had the saying that they would rather starve to death than eat the “alms of insult.” It seems that humiliating others does not necessarily always mean depriving them of their things; in many cases, giving things to others is instead a greater humiliation. Those poor students are already sore enough having to take scholarship money; and now they must even write letters of “gratitude”? Put yourself in their shoes: would those female entrepreneurs be willing to do that? The female entrepreneur on TV also said that it was not only a matter of students being grateful to the benefactors, but even more a matter of being grateful to society, and so on. That is really well put! Looking at the rich in society, living freely and casually, doing charity, raising pets for fun, and then comparing that with themselves, seeing such a serious gap between rich and poor, how exactly are the poor students supposed to be grateful to society? It would already be quite good if they did not hate this society; and yet they are to be so calm and matter-of-fact, so righteous and self-assured, as to toy with the feelings of those poor students? Those female entrepreneurs are indeed grateful to society — why don’t they usually write a few more thank-you letters to the Party and the state to show their feelings?
The rich are truly infuriating! And yet I myself am also one of the rich; what am I to do then……
September 3, 2007
2007-09-04 15:33:50 Anonymous 221.130.189.94 [reply]
It’s all exchange… it’s all exchange…
Teacher Wang Haiming once very cunningly said that the origins of various good deeds can all be reduced to self-interest
Guxia
2007-09-04 18:09:19 http://epr.ycool.com/ [reply]
Wang Haiming’s saying of “doing good to others for one’s own benefit” is indeed correct (but not good).
Hoping to gain inner satisfaction through doing good is a good thing; the problem is that one’s own inner satisfaction cannot be built on trampling on the inner lives of others.
A few more words in addition to the article: the female entrepreneurs may say that although they didn’t write thank-you letters to the Party and the state, isn’t sponsoring poor students the best way to show gratitude? In a sense, this is very true — today’s prosperity in China is built upon the widening of the gap between rich and poor, and those female entrepreneurs who were able to “get rich first” did so on the basis of the sacrifices of poor people. Therefore, the female entrepreneurs should repay kindness, and finding poor students is the right approach. Then the female entrepreneurs’ act of sponsorship is “repaying kindness,” not bestowing favor — they were originally in debt of gratitude. In that case, as a person repaying kindness, yet assuming the stance of one bestowing favor, and then demanding that the ones being repaid be grateful to them, what kind of logic is that? Who exactly lacks a sense of gratitude?
mist
2007-09-04 21:55:09 Anonymous 124.17.16.85 [reply]
Whether one should repay kindness to the Party and the city-state, if demanded thoroughly, then it seems the poor can indeed find grounds to
resent the Party and the city-state.
To become rich and then repay kindness to the Party and the city-state is because one’s own becoming rich could not have been realized without them; then should poverty also repay kindness to the Party and the city-state? Once rich, one thanks policy — but wasn’t the poverty before also caused by policy?
Guxia
2007-09-04 23:29:05 http://epr.ycool.com/ [reply]
I said that female entrepreneurs should be grateful to the Party and the state only as a bit of satire; but the rich really do need to be grateful to the poor, because their wealth is built on the foundation of the vast numbers of poor.
mist
2007-09-04 23:41:23 Anonymous 124.17.16.85 [reply]
These expressions of gratitude may not necessarily be accepted by the poor…
Compared with merely giving material things, a better method may perhaps be to give the poor a way to become rich as well
Guxia
2007-09-05 00:24:26 http://epr.ycool.com/ [reply]
Gratitude is of course not merely material giving, and it is not necessarily a written or oral expression either; gratitude can exist without any “expression.”
As for giving the poor a way to become rich as well, in absolute terms that does not exist, unless communism is realized. In practical terms, I think the urgent task is to build a system of social welfare and social security. But even so, it still seems difficult to solve the problems of agriculture, rural areas, and farmers…… China’s problems are too complex; they really are not something ordinary people can handle. 。
mist
2007-09-05 13:24:22 Anonymous 221.130.189.94 [reply]
Popper seems to think that the function of government is to remove troubles rather than create well-being. I quite agree with this, after all each person’s happiness has to be fought for by oneself. But for the present, the city-state is still not doing enough in removing difficulties, while in creating well-being it has gone overboard.
yeziqiu
2007-09-05 16:06:17 Anonymous 61.148.45.150 [reply]
The wealth of those who got rich first cannot be said to be built on the sacrifice of poor people; most of those who got rich first still rely on their own hard work (this does not include those who got rich first by relying on the power in their hands), and the reason some poor people are poor is mostly because of laziness, not because they nobly sacrificed themselves. This is not proactively giving up wealth; rather, it is wanting wealth without being willing to pay the price, and then one can only remain poor.
Guxia
2007-09-05 19:03:27 http://epr.ycool.com/ [reply]
yeziqiu’s words seem a bit naive. Indeed, on the micro level, most of those who get rich do rely on hard work, but what we are discussing is a macro problem. The rich-poor difference here is not about two people of similar background in some city, one diligent and one lazy, resulting in a wealth gap. On the macro level, the rich-poor gap is manifested in the disparity between the east and west of the country, and the gap between urban and rural areas. If you have a better understanding of the current situation in Chinese cities, you will find that, for example, in Beijing and in Shanghai, the most hardworking and industrious are often people from other places. To a very large extent, it is people from other places who support the development of the localities. What would Beijing, or Shanghai, look like without migrant laborers? Moreover, there is the main force driving the Chinese economy, “Made in China” — what made China into the “world’s factory”? The future is hard to say, but for a long period in the past, it undoubtedly relied on cheap labor. Why could labor be so cheap? Again, because of the rich-poor gap — if you don’t do it, poorer people are willing to do it, so wages can’t go up. Imagine: if the rich-poor gap were not so severe, would there be such a huge flow of population? Would there be such cheap labor? And without these, China’s economic growth would be a different matter altogether.
As for whether the function of government is active and proactive or passive and reactive, that is a distinction between East and West that has existed since ancient times. Placing too much emphasis on the active side of government work is indeed a major problem in China today.
Guxia
2007-09-05 19:17:56 http://epr.ycool.com/ [reply]
yeziqiu said, “this does not include those who got rich first by relying on the power in their hands”; I think, on the one hand, you may lack social experience and underestimate this society’s “rules of the game.” On the other hand, even if we only consider the group that became wealthy through fair competition, in fact it is not completely fair either. In particular, I wonder how much you appreciate the significance of a big-city household registration? That day Teacher Yu repeatedly emphasized that one should look for work that can settle one’s household registration, and not do migrant labor; there is a reason for that. A single household-registration certificate determines your superiority from the moment you are born. This is the “power in your hands.” Without relying on it, it is difficult for a rural person to achieve the same accomplishments. Even after exhausting all efforts and managing to get into Peking University or Tsinghua University (that counts as hard work enough, doesn’t it?), one still may not be able to obtain a Beijing household registration, and undergraduates almost certainly cannot obtain a Shanghai household registration.
Why is household registration so valuable? Why is an American household registration even more valuable? — household registration means welfare and security. In China’s metropolises such as Shanghai and Beijing, certain welfare and security systems have already been established, but they are still very lacking, let alone in the vast rural areas.
mist
2007-09-05 19:29:19 Anonymous 124.17.16.85 [reply]
The household registration system is originally an unjust phenomenon: first it creates a distinction between urban and rural areas, and second it restricts the free movement of population — A was born to be exploited, who told him to be born with a rural household registration or a household registration in a remote area? In the stage of primitive accumulation, such injustice is necessary for social development, but once this injustice reaches a certain degree, the side that has enjoyed the benefits should give the exploited side appropriate compensation.
The superiority of household registrations in some regions now also seems to be built on the basis of exploiting household registrations in other regions. I wonder if you still remember when we went to Shanxi for practice, Uncle Cao? He said that even if the people of Shanxi have no electricity to use, priority must be given to Beijing people’s electricity use; even if the people of Shanxi have no water to drink, priority must be given to Beijing people’s water use. In order to ensure Beijing’s environment, the people of Shanxi sacrifice their own environment to build all kinds of highly polluting factories. Yet the city-state has not given proportionate returns to the exploited group, and this further creates social injustice.
Guxia
2007-09-05 19:34:19 http://epr.ycool.com/ [reply]
Hehe, it’s no use for Mist to complain to me~ When I said that the rich’s sudden wealth is built on the sacrifices of the poor, that’s exactly what I meant.
mist
2007-09-05 19:37:46 Anonymous 211.166.9.17 [reply]
At most I’m just grumbling on my blog~ When I was young, my parents and neighbors wanted me to make being an official my ambition; perhaps I also thought that way then. But after university, I really have changed a great deal.
yeziqiu
2007-09-06 19:13:38 Anonymous 211.161.40.232 [reply]
I have deep feelings about household registration; finding a job last year was the first consideration. Many classmates, because their household registration could not be settled, suffered greatly, and in the end had no choice but to leave Beijing and go to other places
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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