China-US Soft Power Differences Behind Two Car Thefts

These [last] two days, during a “love relay” around a two-month-old child from Jilin, Changchun became a landscape of “beautiful China.” Although the car thief eventually surrendered himself to justice, two-month-old Hao Bo was strangled to death, turning the love story this spring into a human tragedy.

Coincidentally, not long ago, a vehicle theft also occurred in faraway America with a completely different outcome. According to U.S. media reports, on Feb. 5 local time, after a young couple left a store, ready to drive away, the man went back into the store because he was still thinking about a phone he saw. He held the phone up by the window to his girlfriend, who stepped out of the Jeep to take a closer look. At that time, the thief quickly drove their car away. The man rushed out to chase the car, but failed in his attempt and then called the police. 40 minutes after the police received the call, the dispatch center received another call [from a caller] who hung up right after stating that a baby girl was found inside a Jeep and the exact location of the vehicle. The police immediately went to the location of the stolen Jeep and rescued the baby. (China Daily, March 6)

On the one hand, the Chinese car thief saw the crying child in the back seat of the car and inhumanely strangled this little boy to death then casually buried him in the snow. On the other hand, the American car thief saw a baby girl in the back seat of the car and, moved by conscience, stopped the car and even communicated the parking place to the police.

It is not difficult to see that behind this great contrast, we are indeed unsuccessful in moral education in these years, which leads to so many people losing their basic humanity for money or personal gain. The car thief who murdered the baby is the latest illustration of this moral decay. In this regard, we indeed need to make great efforts to catch up.

Furthermore, while the couple in Changchun who lost their child deserves sympathy, their act of leaving the two-month-old baby in the car for 10 minutes was extremely wrong, illustrating the shortcomings in China’s child protection. It can be said that many Chinese parents still lack awareness of child protection, which is related to the absence of our child protection regulations. Western countries have legal systems with comprehensive sets of child protection. The first association for child abuse prevention was established in New York as early as 1874. In this regard, we are latecomers; the gap is obvious.

But on the other hand, after the vehicle theft in Changchun, various radio and television stations in Jilin participated in the “love relay” to rescue this child, thousands of volunteers and taxi drivers aided the police to find the stolen car and tens of thousands of Internet users nationwide — even the People’s Daily and CCTV — forwarded all of the related rescue messages on microblogs, actively engaging in this “love relay.” This also highlights the huge social mobilization force in Chinese society, showing the advantage of the socialist system.

In Western countries such as the U.S., it is difficult to imagine that there would be so many volunteers, especially taxi drivers who can put aside their own work and participate in a “love relay” voluntarily. It is also difficult to imagine so much mainstream media being so actively involved in a “love relay.” It is even harder to imagine so many police being deployed so quickly. It can be said that the huge social mobilization force is undoubtedly a big advantage China has.

From these two car theft cases, we see that in child protection and moral education, especially humanity education, China is not doing enough, but in social mobilization, it is doing better than the U.S. How to maintain one’s own advantage but also catch up in other areas is worth pondering.