Peng Fei, an 11-year-old boy of Jiangjin, Chongqing municipality in Southeast China, saw a man stealing money from an old man on a bus. "Stop, you pickpocket," he shouted. The thief grabbed the boy by the throat and slapped him hard. All the other people on the bus, including the driver and the conductor, watched silently; nobody tried to protect the boy, who burst into tearful cries.

Shame on these adults!

Nowadays, it seems to have become common for people to turn a blind eye to thefts on buses. But the event last week is shocking, for more than 30 adults remained inactive in front of a bandit bullying a boy who bravely tried to stop the man twice his size. What happened to the manhood of the male passengers at the scene? Did they not have even an iota of righteous indignation?

When robbery becomes more and more violent today, it may be understandable - and forgivable - that onlookers dare not step forward to stop the crime. But there is a limit. When a weak, defenseless child is threatened, as in the case of Peng, any man with a sense of righteousness will fly into a great rage and shout a "Stop!" to the thug. Regrettably, nobody did so in this particular event.

To avoid bringing possible dangers or troubles to themselves, many people choose not to do anything when witnessing a criminal attempt. Their intrinsic sense of justice is submerged in the selfish worries over their own safety.

Certainly, such selfishness is not to be blamed when a danger is involved, for anyone has the right to protect his/her own safety. But in the Peng case, the men on the bus should well have been moved into action for at least two reasons. First, a child was being tortured. Second, the danger to their own safety was not so serious, for so many men could well overpower the thief.

It is lamentable that we have become so cowardly in the face of criminals. Don't we feel ashamed thinking of the bravery of the boy? And what kind of a lesson do we expect our kids to draw from the case? Now educators tell children that they should not try to prevent a crime for it would bring dangers to them. This advice is right. But the problem in the above-mentioned case is not that of safety; instead, it is the imprint we adults have left in the heart of the boy - and all children - with our cowardice.

It will be a real danger for our society if cowardice prevails more and more over our righteous indignation at evils from one generation to the next.

Children's intrinsic and untainted sense of righteousness is precious. We should never do anything to hurt this feeling. Many adults, however, are ruining this innocent feeling with their dishonorable behaviors. An event reported by Shijiazhuang, Hebei province-based Yanzhao Evening News last month was such a scandal.

A 7-year-old boy picked up a coin of 10 fen (0.1 yuan) from the ground in a park. He went to the street outside the park and handed the coin to a traffic police officer. The man, however, threw the coin to the ground and went away, leaving the boy puzzled over what he had been taught by his teachers.

For several decades in the latter half of the last century, a song titled One Fen encouraged children to hand money they came upon on the ground to the police. It helped people of several generations foster the virtue of not pocketing the money they found on the street. By throwing away the coin, the policeman in Shijiazhuang actually told the child to throw away the good tradition.

Now our living standards have greatly improved. We can afford to provide more material comforts for our kids. But we seem to be ignoring a more important "nutrient" for their growth - a sense of morality.

E-mail: liushinan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 05/14/2008 page8)