93. "The concept of 'individual responsibility' is a necessary fiction. Although societies must hold individuals accountable for their own actions, people's behavior is largely determined by forces not of their own making."
正文：
Some scholars call the 21st century as "the age of individual responsibility" while some argue that the society should be absolutely responsible for its member's behaviors. In my opinion, the two are complementary rather than mutually exclusive.
On the one hand, as a kind of social animals, humans not independent but have a thousand and one links with the others. The fact that we are all members of the society and are interwoven with each other reminds us to be careful about behaviors. One should not only care what his behavior may bring to himself but also consider what influence the behavior may have on other people. The subtlety of relations can be described by the theory of "Butterfly Effect" put forward by Lorenz: "A butterfly’s flapping its wings may cause the tornado in Texas". Thus, the individual responsibility should not be limited to the responsibility for oneself but the one for both oneself and the society.
On the other hand, our behaviors are not controlled by ourselves only. Often our conducts are strongly influenced even confined by the society. After all, we live in the environment created by the society. By setting the standard to evaluate the behaviors of individuals, the society can exert great or even overwhelming influence on the individuals. For example, suppose there are two persons, one is with high moral standards but in a society with low morality; the other is with low moral standards but in a society with high morality. What will happen? Maybe the former is called as a saint while the latter is called as a devil. But there is one thing similar: both are regarded as abnormal. At last, the two may become the same as the others because the pressure exerted by the environment is tremendous. Then we can understand why it is of great importance for the government to create a proper environment which facilitates the healthy growing of its people. I call it society responsibility or public responsibility.
The lack of either individual responsibility or public responsibility could lead to disastrous results. When confronted with the crisis, the terrible results are more obvious. The epidemic of SARS in china is a case in point. When China was hit by SARS, the governments were accused to have hidden the true situations from the public, which caused the serious epidemic of SARS in the first month. However, after careful investigation, we discovered that many people hid the facts that they had been infected just to avoid segregation. The result is tragic: not only most of these people died from not receiving treatment in time but also many of their relatives and friends were infected or even died. The lack of individual responsibility combined with governmental delinquency lead to the passive situation that could have been avoided. I believe no one can live out of the society. When crisis happens, the governments should undertake the major responsibilities, but individuals should be responsible for themselves and the others. If everyone is aware of his responsibility for the society and does not only look for individual rights while neglecting duties, the society can get through any difficulty without suffering much loss.
To sum up, no one is responsible for himself only while the society should be responsible for all its members. The joint effects of individual responsibility and social responsibility make the human society advance.
[ Last edited by staralways on 2005-8-14 at 23:25 ]作者: antiering 时间: 2005-8-16 22:05:53