What's Going On in China?

Reading some news online earlier, I saw that there were a couple of mass murders that occurred in China the past couple of days. One involved a guy who started running people over with a tractor.  The other involved a man who snuck into a school and then used a knife to attack teachers and children.

Besides these two events, there has been a spate of other mass murders that have occurred, causing outsiders to wonder what is happening.  Many people are speculating that the dramatic change China is going through (from a Communist country to a more Capitalist country) is taking a mental toll on poorer citizens.   The concern is that mental illness is growing and the government is not addressing the issue properly.

While I don't live in China, being an American Born Chinese person, I have some insight into why some of these problems may be happening.

Though my upbringing is a mix of Chinese and American,  I know that many Chinese people prefer keep their problems "in the house".  They don't not want outsiders to know their dirty laundry.   This causes many problems, especially for kids like me who were born Chinese-American.  I remember reading a few years ago about some young Chinese-American kids who committed suicide because they couldn't handle the pressure of school and other things.   This set off many Chinese-American mental health groups to reach out to the community to let people know that is was OK to share their problems.   I don't know about the success of the outreach but hopefully the Chinese-American community is better off.

Keeping what I said in mind, the citizens of China may not have the options that we have in the United States.   There are definitely support groups but as a whole Chinese culture is conservative and it's difficult to change the collective mindset.

I haven't been in China since 2007 so I don't know how things have changed.  However, I'm sure that China is moving to the future at a unprecedented pace.  Unfortunately, like many things, some people have an easier time than others.

While the recent issues have been disturbing, I hope that this causes China to look at the issues and address them appropriately so that these kind of things don't happen again.