For the full article click here.
A homeless man was in a fight on the street and knocked unconscious. People cared enough to move him onto the curb, but he was then left laying on the sidewalk for almost 20 minutes until a worker in a nearby grocery store called 911. The man died in the hospital 3 days later of brain trauma.
Unlike Kitty Genovese or the Kings County hospital cases we talked about in class, it seems there were other reasons besides diffusion of responsibility that the police were not called immediately; the man was homeless and it was in a neighborhood with many illegal immigrants. Illegal immigrants may have failed to help because they most likely feared entrapment; if they are here illegally they do not want to bring the police's attention to themselves.
Bystanders could have also failed to recognize that there was anything wrong; there were other drunk homeless men around on the street; it's possible the bystanders didn't recognize he was injured, and may have assumed he was just sleeping. A man interviewed in the news clip admits that he did nothing, claiming that it was because of the neighborhood that no one cared.
It's hard to tell from the news story what the bystanders were thinking because it only gives a few lines from their interview, which could very easily be taken out of context. Yet the witnesses in the video say that they did not not call the police. One man who was interviewed said he knew there was a problem, but didn't know what was going; this could mean he assumed someone else was taking care of it. Another man interviewed said that he saw the man get knocked unconscious, yet he did not call the police, we can assume he thought someone else would and didn't want the responsibility. The men interviewed were not alone in their reasons; according to the article 166 people walked by the unconscious man and did nothing to help, it's pretty shocking that 166 people can all have a reason or excuse not to help someone who needs it.
15 comments:
This sort of events seems to happen more frequently nowadays because of the economic crisis. I see more homeless people are wandering outside to seek something to eat. I witnessed two accidents recently in the subway. There was a guy who stood up from his seat and walked toward the train gate to get out. At that moment he fell down and had a seizure. Every passenger was embarrassed and one of them reached to him and applied emergency treatment to him. Fortunately the train stopped and policemen came. A few minutes later he woke up and eventually left the place. I was one of the crowd at that time and couldn’t do anything maybe didn’t do. I also thought somebody would take care of him and watched what was going on in front of me. I was one of the anonymous crowds trapped in the diffusion of responsibility.
When I read the article and watched the video clip Erin linked I imagined what if the victim was a man with a nice suite on which tells he is not the homeless person. Then would he had gotten attention from people in the neighborhood and treated immediately. I think so. When people see a homeless or beggar they don’t care about them at all. They think these people have a mental disruption and they are there because they have no where to go. They might have been treated at the hospital but couldn’t afford money so they were just evacuated from the facility. They might not have families either. No one knows about their situations. Then who would take responsibility for these kinds of people. When people consider Cost-benefit ratio they would decide not to get entrapped because they already had enough things to take care of in their daily lives; especially, in the neighborhood where mostly is occupied by immigrants. It is a very sad fact. I think the anonymous crowd effect happens more likely in big countries with a large population.
Let's further go into how this deals with social psychology. Before I do that I want to say that I do agree with David on some points that he made about the article. When you pointed out that "I imagined a man with a nice suit on which tells he is not a homeIess person. Then he would have gotten attention from people in the neighborhood and treated immediately". Whether the man was homeless or not people would have still reacted in the same way. Yes people would have probably reacted faster but because of the cost benefit ratio he still would have been left there. "People are less likely to take an independent action if the personal, physical, or financial, or financial costs to them are high "(ch.10 pg349). People do not want to get too involved when there is a situation where someone may need help, its sad but many studies have shown that we cannot rely on human nature. (Milgrams study). People are so quick to try to "mind their own business", they only look out or themselves. In this case most people did not tell because they were illegal immigrants maybe. They were not going to risk by getting involved.
It is true things like this happen every day around the world and especially in NYC. I think if it were a man in a business suite who was being beaten for a brew, the outcome of the scenario would be totally different. This is a perfect example of the “by stander effect”. It is frightening and shocking that something like this could happen in today’s society. A couple of days ago I watch something 10 times more horrific on You Tube. A 19-year-old Abraham Biggs in southern Florida broadcasted his own suicide over the Internet, and blogged about what he planned to do. This all started on the website bodybuilding.com were the blog was posted. He then streamed a live web cam on Justin.TV of himself overdosing on pills that were for his Bi-Polar disorder. Many people who actually watched the stream thought it was a hoax, but soon found out it sure wasn’t. The stream went on for nine hours as thousands of people watch this young man slowly expire right in front of their eyes. Yet again no one took action until it was too late and police who were called anonymously found the boy dead in his room. In this cases due to the diffusion of responsibility someone lost their life while two thousand people watched and even said things like “that’s not enough to kill yourself” or “go ahead and do it”. What does this say about of our society? And what would of happen if someone called immediately? I’ll let you answer that.
This is just messed up... And yeah I agree with everyone here, that just because he was a homeless man people didn't really care or even bother to help. They just kept walking by and did nothing. I guess it really depends on the person. But people have to really think about the situation... what if something like that happened to a family member or friend? And no one did anything... wouldn't they be really angry? It doesn't matter if that man was homeless or not... all those people that were in that video should have helped this man out immediately or at least one person should have... Because even if a man or woman is homeless or not, they are still somebody's mother, father, brother, sister... etc. If I saw a person, homeless or not, just laying there or in need of help and didn't look or seem like he or she was sleeping... and if it was a situation where I could do something I would definitely have done something to help. I can't believe things like this happen in the world.
These events reminded me of something that happened a few years ago in queens, oin a G train station. A woman was raped on the platform, and both a train conductor and a booth attendant knew what was going on. they called for help, but neither actually tried to stop the event.
"A 21-year-old woman on her way to her boyfriend's house was raped on a Long Island City subway platform early yesterday, the police said. The attacker fled before the police arrived. The rape occurred shortly after 3 a.m. at the 21st Street stop of the southbound G train, the police said. The attacker first approached the woman on the train, and she argued with him and tried to get away, missing her stop, the police said. At the next stop the woman tried to flee up the stairs, but the man grabbed her and pulled her back down, raping her in front of the token booth, the police said. The clerk hit an alarm button, and a passing motorman also called for help" - NY times.
This reminds me both of the Kitty Genovese incident and of our discussion of group roles, in this situation both the tokenbooth attendant and the train conductor did not want to leave their posts, or stray from their job rules to help the woman(see ny1 article, http://www.ny1.com/Default.aspx?ArID=51475). Though both made calls for help, neither tryed to prevent the crime or got physically involved. The fact that the tokenbooth attendant watched the whole event, where the woman was chased, dragged, and brutally raped, is very scary. Even worse, there was no group of people, which strays from the Kitty Genovese story as well as the concept of the bystander effect. The tokenbooth attendant knew that he was the only person there who could help. It seems that his job rules replaced the bystander effect as a way for him to ignore or feel less responsible to help.
This story also stands out because the victim was easier to relate to then say, a woman in the 70's or a homeless man. She was within a few years of my age, taking the G train which most Pratt Students take, to an area in which I've gone to and many Pratt students live.
Hi David,
The economy is an interesting theory. Do some "truth seeking" and see if there is any research that supports this....I'll be interested to know. rw
Hi Danielle,
Good job pulling in the cost-benefit ratio.
You also said "Whether the man was homeless or not people would have still reacted in the same way."
There are actually lots of studies out there in which people are more likely to help a well suited homeless person than one that looks more needy. Find one of those studies and post it here!
Branimir,
Excellent example. I won't send you on any fact finding missions this time around!
rw
Hi David,
The economy is an interesting theory. Do some "truth seeking" and see if there is any research that supports this....I'll be interested to know. rw
Hi Hannah,
I agree, it really is an injustice.
Could you take your post a bit deeper with some of the blog criteria?
rw
Danielle, Lily, David and Hannah,
Read up on this fellows work and respond:
http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/k.j.jonas/
You should find it relevant to some of the issues you raised... rw
And Erin, good job getting the conversation started! rw
I agree with what Branimir said, if the person was of a different social level, or even race, there would've been a different outcome, but this is NYC and homeless people really don't seem to get that much attention.
Also Lily, I think your post is a good example of how people were able to help, but not willing to, or they can't, in fear of the attacker maybe doing something to them in return if they tried anything. Were there anyone else on the platform besides the conductor and the person in the booth?
By the way David... out of curiosity what train were you on? I swear I think I was waiting on that same train to arrive, the announcements said that the trains were delayed due to a sick person on the previous train.
Every time I see a post on this topic I keep on remembering a clip I watched in Forensics during my high school years. It's amazing how many things relate in these two subjects, really. I actually thought Professor Winkel was going to show us this certain clip, but she showed us the Milgram Study instead. The clip I was first thinking about was a simple one. A volunteer was placed in a room, and told to wait for the person in charge to arrive. Smoke appeared in the room next to him (part of the study). By himself, he went up to the helper in the next room and said there was something wrong. In the next scene, three volunteers were placed in the same room and told to wait on the person in charge. When the smoke came out, no one moved. As smoke began to fill the room and people began to cough, still no one moved. This experiment might've been to the extreme a bit, but it was simple, and got the idea across. I can't help but remember to think of it when I see examples like this.
I do agree that it is more likely that people would help a man with a business suit more than a homeless person. Unfortunately there is also a chance that the businessman would not be helped as well due to the cultural norms of the are.In this particular case I can imagine that the cultural norms would be not to help the businessman due to the fact that this happened in an area that illegal immigrants may be. Which still leads back to the cost benefit ratio.
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