Disturbing Video

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/crime/2009/02/02/beating.victime.ignored.wjla

This video and news story reminded me of a story I learned about in my psychology class about a young lady that was walking home late one night and a stranger came out and stabbed her then ran off, this lady fell to the ground and started screaming but none of the neighbors came out to help her. The man that had stabbed her heard her screaming and came back and stabbed her again in hoped of taking her life, again running away though. She still sat there screaming for help and still nobody came out to help her. When sociologist questioned the people in the neighborhood, they admitted to have heard her screaming but thought that someone else was going to call for help. None of them ended up calling until it was too late which resulted in the victims death similar to this homeless man. Help wasn’t called for twenty minutes! A lady actually loaded her groceries into her car while watching him lay there and many other people passing by just stared. I think that they probably thought the same thing that the neighbors of the girl that was stabbed thought…”Someone else will call”, “It’s not my responsibility”, “I would help but…”. This man did end up dying and it makes me wonder if someone would have stepped in sooner if his life could have been saved. The men that were involved in the fight are going to take responsibility but a simple call to 911, or even helping him get off the ground could have made all the difference but staring was the most people could do until one person called for help twenty minutes later.

The bystander effect, is the tendency for individuals to be less likely to provide help when others are present than when they are alone, as stated in Psychology Applied to Modern Life(Weiten and Lloyd). It is a common thing to ignore someone who needs help when you believe that someone else surely would provide it. The problem is, is that all bystanders are thinking the same thing. I have caught myself doing this two times since my Psychology class. Both times someone went off the road in a ditch. Both times, after feeling a tug at my conscience, I did call 911 for help. Both times the police didn't know about it. One was a very elderly lady who could have been seriously injured and was in a ditch in sub-zero temperatures.

I had watched this video and was just appalled by how many people just walked by like it was no big deal that this man was laying, hurt on the ground. The store owner justified it as okay because it happens on a daily bases. Maybe just maybe it wouldn’t happen if people would take a stand and help these people out. Maybe I think it’s crazy because I live in a small town where we know each other and we’re right there helping someone if needed. Although small town or not I feel it’s the right thing to help people when they are hurt and my conscious kills me when I don’t do the right thing!

I watched this video on Saturday and thought about it as a possibility for my article of the week. It absolutely amazed me when I saw that people actually did just walk on by the man when he was in desperate need of help. It was said by the storeowner that this happens all the time so everyone was probably just thinking it was nothing. That doesn’t mean that someone shouldn’t have just stopped to see if he was okay. The guy might have been okay had someone just stopped to see because it said that once help was called for it only took 20 minutes for an ambulance to get there. It’s ridiculous that no one helped him…people are just too caught up in there own thoughts and thinking about themselves to check on other people. It makes me so angry to watch all of those people just walk by like a guy lying still on the ground is nothing. It’s really disappointing on how long it took someone to actually call for help.