There are often media reports of events in which issues of ethics are involved. These reports often trigger debates among media critics and Internet surfers. In the debates, "human nature" and "human right" are frequently mentioned. In many cases, however, these two concepts are abused.

A few days ago, a teacher posted an article at the www.tianya.cn website telling of his experience in the earthquake that struck Sichuan on May 12. He was giving a lecture in a classroom on an upper floor of a middle school in Dujiangyan when the building trembled. He dashed out of the classroom and hurried downstairs to the playground to find that he was the first to have escaped to safety.

Later, answering a student who accused him of leaving his pupils behind in danger, he said: "I am one who pursues freedom and fairness rather than one who will sacrifice his life to save others. Faced with the choice between life and death, I would possibly consider to sacrifice my life only if it were to save my daughter; I wouldn't care about anybody else even if she was my mother." He then said: "This may sound like finding excuses for myself, but I haven't the slightest sense of guilt."

His frank confession triggered strong responses from the netizens. While most voiced their indignation at the man's "betrayal of teachers' professional ethics", many expressed sympathy for his "involuntary act of human nature" and argued for his "human right" to protect himself. They said the man should not be blamed.

I agree that the man is not legally culpable but I do not think he is completely unblamable.

Admittedly, anyone has the right to stay away from danger when his/her life is threatened. But the man's situation was not simply one where life confronts nature. He was a teacher and his students were in great danger when he ran away alone. Though he was not legally bound to the obligation, protecting students from danger should have been his instinctive reaction when danger struck.

In the May 12 earthquake, scores of teachers died protecting their students from falling buildings. When excavated from the debris, they were all found in the same posture - spreading their arms to shield the children under their bodies. I believe they did so out of a teacher's instinct. They could not have given a thought to anything else in a split second, be it a legal right or an ethical virtue.

Maybe we who did not experience the quake are not eligible to blame the escaped teacher but his act was certainly a deplorable contrast to his colleagues' heroic acts.

More contemptible is his flaunting of his contempt of a man's bravery of protecting the weak - children and elderly - and his unconditional pursuit of "personal freedom". In the 6,100-word article he posted online, a fairly large part was devoted to the defense of this personal freedom.

Those who cited "human nature" and "human right" to defend the man are also deplorable. Perhaps they meant to show how they were impartial and cool-minded amid the nation's passionate support of the heroic deeds of the locals of the quake-stricken areas and the rescuers from across the country. But they were actually confusing right and wrong over the issue of ethics. Most representative of these people was the one who cited the Law on Teachers, which does not rule that a teacher is responsible to protect students in case of natural disasters. "Therefore," the defender said, "the teacher is not blamable."

This is a ridiculous logic, for being legally inculpable does not mean ethically righteous. Those who try to show they are more "civilized" by mocking the public's common sense of righteousness are actually ridiculing themselves.

E-mail: liushinan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 05/28/2008 page8)