China has updated the ’24 Filial Exemplars’, an ancient morality text, to promote filial piety among the new generation. From Tania Branigan at The Guardian:
The original 24 Filial Exemplars date from around the 14th century, when Yuan dynasty scholar Guo Jujing collected the tales of obedient children. They were endlessly reprinted in the centuries that followed, until the Communist party banned them as it sought to eradicate backwards thinking.
The heroes of the work include the son who strangled a tiger to save his father and Dong Yong, a Han dynasty figure who sold himself to pay for his father’s funeral rites.
[…] The new list, promoted by the All China Women’s Federation and the China National Committee on Ageing, appears more prosaic. It urges people to ensure their parents have sufficient health insurance, to take them for medical checks and to give them enough spending money.
[…] Changing social mores, the embryonic state of the social safety net and the demographic “timebomb” of a fast-ageing population have made officials keener than ever to promote filial piety.
