Such sadness...

I go through phases with my reading - a few years back I read a lot of books about women in China and the value, or lack thereof, placed on their lives.
Particularly that of girl children, given the one child policy instigated to control population growth.

As a mother of three girls - the policy, and the impact it has on the population, the value (and often fate) of girls, horrifies me.

But not as much as a story I saw on the ABC last night.

A two year old girl who was run over by a van in a market after wandering away from her parents and then left to die.

This is not just a regular hit and run incident where a callous driver hit her and left her to die, it's infinitely worse than that.

• Firstly the driver, who has since been charged, admits he made sure both his front and rear wheels ran over the child so as to kill her to avoid him having to pay medical expenses.

• Next there were a total of 18 people - including another parent with their child, who walked, rode or drove past this suffering child and did not stop to offer any assistance.

• Lastly another driver ran her over as she lay there - still alive - but very close to death.

After nine days in hospital with massive bran damage, the little girl died.

It garners so many questions; about human nature, about the state of affairs in China that someone would attempt to kill a child or fail to offer assistance rather than deal with the financial consequences, about the value of human life.

I stumbled across the story and once I started to watch the footage it was like watching a bus crash - I didn't want to watch but could not turn away, as I saw person after person fail to render help to a CHILD in such dire need.

And then I cried, and cried.

What is the world coming to?

There's nothing I can do to 'fix' this, I have nothing to offer these grieving parents but to encourage you all to take a moment to say remember this child as you go through your day, and use the thoughts and memories of her lost life, to encourage you to do good.

Something small.
Smile as you pass people, hold a door open for someone, pay the toll for the car behind you, engage in the community in some way - it can be as simple as chatting to the person who serves you in a shop rather than treating them as nameless or faceless.

Restore the humanity to humankind.
Do it in memory of Yue Yue.

Read/see the story here, but please be warned if you do decide to watch the video - it is incredibly disturbing.