On October 30, a 10-year-old student in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, jumped to death from the 30th floor of a building.

Earlier that day, the boy was found chatting with his classmates while attending a Chinese recitation competition, and as punishment, the angry master gave him the choice of standing for one hour, or composing a 1,000-character self-criticism.

He chose to end his life.

Many point an accusing finger at the teacher for being too harsh.

But if we are reminded that punitive standing, jiechi (teacher’s ruler for beating the pupils), and spanking had long been part and parcel of primary education in the past, punishment alone cannot reasonably explain that fatal jump.

It suggests more of a paradigm shift, emblematic of fundamental failure of our education, with its crippling emphasis on knowledge, to the virtual exclusion of the cultivation of nearly every other quality, ethical, emotional, moral or social.

When a pupil degenerates into a number denoting his rank in terms of scores, the precedence of his rank would dictate teachers’ bonuses and advancement, with the result that the pupil-teacher relationship becomes simpler, devoid of the richness traditionally expected of that relationship.

One of my colleagues in his early 40s is still in the habit of seeing to the travel arrangements for some of his middle school teachers from a neighboring province.

Not long ago, such favors were taken for granted, as evidenced by the cliched observation that “a teacher for one day is a father for a lifetime.”

When Confucian scholar Fang Xiaoru (1357-1402), one of the most respected scholars in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), was condemned to death, his disciples had to share his fate with him.

The reduction into a number of that relationship suggests a total breach of the trust formerly residing in that relationship.

Today it’s more like a business relationship, deceptively vigorous or compelling at times, but lasting no longer than a deal.

And when that relationship is depleted of trust, it can be risky.

Litigious parents

Late October 23, in Beijing, a junior middle school student plunged to his death from the 17th story of a building. That afternoon the boy had injured a fellow student while they were playing, and he was administered a severe dressing-down by his teachers.

Like the first victim, this was also a good student, disciplined, among the top five in his class, who had vowed on several occasions to his mother that when he had son in the future, the son would be the fu’erdai (the second generation rich).

After the tragedy, the parents and relatives of the deceased made a scene at the school, and demanded 1,480,000 yuan (US$242,000) in compensation.

One irony from the incident is that the tragedy was a backlash from the school’s precautionary measures to minimize campus accidents.

The boy had to be punished because the school authorities are in mortal fear of confronting litigious parents who would hold the school responsible for any injuries incurred by the children on the campus.

But teenagers are liable to injuries, whether at school or outside school.

Hence such ridiculous measures as forbidding boys in primary schools to go outside the classroom during the break, except with express approval.

Unlike traditional education that aimed at bringing up a person morally by equipping him with the first principles of a loyal subject, a filial child, or responsible parent, today the aim of education is narrowly egoistic, with the pupils as the putative beneficiaries.

Thus students attend schools in the tacit belief of obtaining higher and higher scores, which ultimately translate into money or power.

The parents and the teachers conspire to rank the children higher, as they all have a stake in the rank.

When the above two “good” students took their fatal plunges, did it ever occur to them how their behavior would affect their parents and the teachers?

Apparently, our education system provides no space for such digressive contemplations.

What’s their chief concern in addition to the scores?

Empty kids

My 10-year-old son told me a couple of days ago that while leaving school this week he had a chance encounter with a friend who was heading the other way on a bike peddled by his ayi. They had time to exchange only a few words.

I asked what these few words were. My son replied that he told him, “That gun [in a computer game] is equipped with a sniper-scope!”

That morning during breakfast I was so moved when I came to a passage from the Analects, that I eagerly recited a paragraph to the effect that “When we see men of worth, we should think of equaling them; when we see men of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves.”

When I read, he was munching his rolled pancake, listening expressionless.

Over 30 years ago, I read a novel titled “empty-hearted boy.” I found that an apt description of the mental state of our “flowers of the motherland.” Well-clad, well-fed, but empty.

Zhou Qiong, a reporter with www.caixin.com, blogged recently of the ennui of a four-year-old boy.

Ennui

That morning, the boy played for a while with plastic jigsaw puzzles, then strolled awhile in the neighborhood. He returned home after mixing with a fellow kid for half an hour.

Then he was distracted by a story told by his mother for about 30 minutes, and concluded, “Staying at home is no fun.”

He watched a cartoon on a computer for 20 minutes, and then, turning it off, stated, “That is no fun, either.”

He walked restlessly at home, and, overcome by a strong sense of ennui, fell into sobs.

According to some, the concept of boredom simply did not exist before the industrial age. We have taken from children everything worth their aspirations: Natural habitats, wilderness, neighborhood, and curiosity.

We have also deprived them of the contentment of standing and staring, doing nothing, and feeling blissful.

The irony is that the only people capable of taking a generous view of life and other people are those who have experienced life in all its tribulations and ordeals. As our ancestors proved time and again, they were “sadder” but “wiser.”

Hopefully, in the aftermath of these tragedies, we may go beyond recriminations, becoming “sadder,” but “wiser.”