Paparazzi's immorality over singer's death

File photo taken on Aug. 27, 2014 shows singer Yao Beina at a performance staged in Qiqihar, northeast China's Heilongjiang Province. (Xinhua/Wang Yonggang)

The light of star Yao Beina has been extinguished. The 33-year-old singer died of breast cancer last Friday in Shenzhen, Guangdong province.

She stood out in China CCTV's Young Singer TV Grand Prix in 2008, and later sung all the theme songs in the TV hit The Legend of Zhenhuan and the Chinese version of Let it Go in Disney's Frozen.

The celebrity's death at such an early age is not only a tragedy for her family and fans, but also a stark reminder of the danger of breast cancer. Movingly, the talented singer made a final wish to donate her corneas, which is quite rare in China due to traditional beliefs. Two patients returned to the world of light on Saturday thanks to her donation.

However, there is a darker side to her death as some reporters from the Shenzhen Evening Post dressed up as medical staff, it has been alleged with the help of the surgeon, and sneaked into the mortuary and took photos of her body. Such a despicable act was offensive to Yao's family, and Yao's employer Huayi Music said it plans to sue the Shenzhen tabloid and the surgeon. On Sunday the tabloid apologized for taking photos and deleted some, while the surgeon insisted he wasn't involved.

This has sparked fierce debate about the Chinese paparazzi over the weekend. Such a controversy is relatively new to China, but has existed in the West for a long time. In 1997, Princess Diana died in a car crash in Paris with her boyfriend Dodi Fayed, when the car they were in crashed as the driver sought to escape the paparazzi chasing after them.

Compared with the paparazzi's long history in the West, China's paparazzi have only mushroomed over the past decade with the rapid development of Chinese TV dramas and movies. According to several media surveys recent years, more than 60 percent of respondents expressed great interest in celebrity-related news.

No wonder the paparazzi go to such lengths to satisfy the readers' curiosity in the rat race of the media market. But Yao's widely circulated photo in ICU showed it is time to strike a balance between the public's right to know and the privacy of public figures.

Celebrities, although they don't affect ordinary people's lives in the way government officials or business tycoons do, influence society by being the originators and leaders of social trends. Hence it's all right for the media to report both the good and the bad about the celebrities. The news about some actors and singers caught taking drugs can play an important role in urging celebrities to behave themselves and set a good example for the young.

However, in Yao's case, the paparazzi, despite claiming Yao's family forgave them later, showed no care for the bereaved family the minute they took photos without permission. And they didn't respect Yao's life or death.

Hopefully, this will be a wake-up call for the Chinese paparazzi to set up their moral bottom line, and Yao can rest in peace.

The author Zhu Ping is an editor with China Daily. zhuping@chinadaily.com.cn