CHINA, NATIONAL, BEIJING, SOCIETY, NEWS BRIEF, Is the "Right" Job Worth a Life?
By Tian Yuan
Five Peking University students committed suicide in the past seven months, a death toll far greater than any previous year. It has aroused a lot of attention at what is often considered to be China's premier university.
On April 22nd, 2005, a girl undergraduate student majoring in Chinese jumped from the 9th floor of building no. 2. On May 7th, a male doctor majoring in mathematics jumped from the same building. On July 26th, a male undergraduate student majoring in psychology jumped from the veranda of the 5th floor of building no. 33. There were two other deaths with no exact time and place.
Blood clearly rang the alarm bell for all the students. They have begun to reconsider the meaning of life.
The most typical reaction was from Lian, a postgraduate student studying Chinese, "It's your own business. Nature provided us the choice of life, how to live it, or whether we live it or not, is a private thing." To such students, living and dying are natural acts therefore should be private choices.
Other students argued that being a member of China's top university, they should be more responsible for family and society than others. Life was first and for the most part a social process rather than a natural one. Therefore they should not treat current difficulties as too important, but to devote themselves to studying well and working for the country in the future.
What's more, their gaining a successful living was also an important source of their family's happiness. To them, the students who committed suicide were cowards who could not face or overcome the hardships of life and were irresponsible to their parents.
There were some students who had thought about killing themselves because of the "unbearable" pressure on their shoulders. With the proliferation of college graduates, it's become very difficult for students to find the good jobs they and their parents had expected after graduation. Even students of Peking University cannot avoid it. Which is why the students there are thinking and talking about the value of life. And death.
Five Peking University students committed suicide in the past seven months, a death toll far greater than any previous year. It has aroused a lot of attention at what is often considered to be China's premier university.
On April 22nd, 2005, a girl undergraduate student majoring in Chinese jumped from the 9th floor of building no. 2. On May 7th, a male doctor majoring in mathematics jumped from the same building. On July 26th, a male undergraduate student majoring in psychology jumped from the veranda of the 5th floor of building no. 33. There were two other deaths with no exact time and place.
Blood clearly rang the alarm bell for all the students. They have begun to reconsider the meaning of life.
The most typical reaction was from Lian, a postgraduate student studying Chinese, "It's your own business. Nature provided us the choice of life, how to live it, or whether we live it or not, is a private thing." To such students, living and dying are natural acts therefore should be private choices.
Other students argued that being a member of China's top university, they should be more responsible for family and society than others. Life was first and for the most part a social process rather than a natural one. Therefore they should not treat current difficulties as too important, but to devote themselves to studying well and working for the country in the future.
What's more, their gaining a successful living was also an important source of their family's happiness. To them, the students who committed suicide were cowards who could not face or overcome the hardships of life and were irresponsible to their parents.
There were some students who had thought about killing themselves because of the "unbearable" pressure on their shoulders. With the proliferation of college graduates, it's become very difficult for students to find the good jobs they and their parents had expected after graduation. Even students of Peking University cannot avoid it. Which is why the students there are thinking and talking about the value of life. And death.
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