Writer Huang Chun-ming (黃春明) has expressed concern over a lack of spiritual education in young Taiwanese, saying this has led to an overtly self-centered and selfish attitude.
In an interview with the Central News Agency, the 80 year-old recounted an incident a couple years ago when he was on a train and he accidentally bumped into a high-school student’s book bag
Huang said he apologized, but the student and his friends responded with laughter. When he told the students they should not be raucous on the train, they replied: “It doesn’t matter, you’re almost dead anyway.”
“In the past, even gangsters were polite to their elders,” Huang said, adding that at the time he had been enraged to the point of being unable to speak.
Huang said that looking back at the incident it is his opinion that modern society lacks family and lifestyle education, leading young people to become more self-centered.
Everyone starts off at the same level, but after growing up some people nonetheless commit crimes, despite their good education, Huang said.
He used a baking analogy, saying that people who do not have the right hands molding them with a good social and family education become “charred” cakes.
Huang said that he put a lot of emphasis on educating his children in all fields.
Environmental education lets us know what kind of trees and fish we are looking at and we are able to name them by sight, Huang said.
Education should cease being all about test scores, Huang said, adding that society should also stop focusing entirely on political strife.
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