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There have actually been studies on this type of phenomena -- people ignoring somebody who needs help. I remember learning about this in college. In one study, they had a room with a bunch of people in it and a room with just one person. A man with a ladder walked by. Then there was a noise that sounded like the man falling off the ladder and being hurt. In the room with more than one person, they just sat there staring at each other, and nobody went to help the man who had fallen. In the room with just one person, the person went out into the hall to investigate. I guess there is something about being with other people where we wait for another person to lead? It's interesting. I haven't seen the video yet, but the girl would probably have been better off it there hadn't been so many witnesses!
 
It was crazy that almost no one stopped to take notice.

I will say though that they did look more like a child arguing with a parent or a step parent more than it looked like an abduction. Not that it is an excuse for inaction but "you're not my dad" is a line lots of kids use on their step dad's and the guy seemed to be lecturing her about where she had been more than threatening or hurting her... so to me they didn't look convincing as an abduction....I am sure some people thought that if this guy was an abductor he would have taken off as soon as he noticed people taking notice and even looking at him.

But maybe that is just me but I think if the girl had said something more to the effect of "I don't know who you are" and "Please help me I don't know this man" then you would have had more people step in. The girl didn't really seem to look directly at people and appeal to them for help in a realistic manner.

I think that a child really being abducted would sound and look a lot more frightened. I also don't think most real abductors would drag the child slowly down the length of the whole street in front of that many witnesses. She just kept reapeating the same two lines and her stuggle didn't look convincing either. It just didn't look like an abduction to me. Maybe that sounds stupid but I can see where people thought it was just a dissobedient child.

Still in this cell phone age you would expect that more people might have at least called for a cop and followed the guy to his vehicle for a license number or something.

My take is that people just didn't think it was an abduction. Maybe that's because I find it hard to believe that people would walk by what they truly thought was a real abduction.

JMHO
 
As for my own son. I have told him that if anyone grabs him he is to scream loudly, kick, hit, yell at the top of his lungs for help, better yet if you are outside and all help is indoors yell "fire" instead of help as people tend to come running to see a fire more than come running to see someone being attacked.....also I told him to fall to the ground as dead weight rather than walk along with the person pulling or pushing him. To not cooperate unless he absolutely had to since cooperation is not any guarantee that the person will go easier on you. I have tried without scaring him too much to make him realize that the person may get angry and hit or kick or threaten him but what the abductor will do when he has him all alone is going to be much much worse..... so fight hard and try to run to anyone else, any house, any person for help.

Hopefully someone witnessing such a scene would step in to interfere.
 
Maybe So said:
As for my own son. I have told him that if anyone grabs him he is to scream loudly, kick, hit, yell at the top of his lungs for help, better yet if you are outside and all help is indoors yell "fire" instead of help as people tend to come running to see a fire more than come running to see someone being attacked.....also I told him to fall to the ground as dead weight rather than walk along with the person pulling or pushing him. To not cooperate unless he absolutely had to since cooperation is not any guarantee that the person will go easier on you. I have tried without scaring him too much to make him realize that the person may get angry and hit or kick or threaten him but what the abductor will do when he has him all alone is going to be much much worse..... so fight hard and try to run to anyone else, any house, any person for help.

Hopefully someone witnessing such a scene would step in to interfere.
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Great tips...also, if they are on a bike or walking w/a bike to hold onto it, it's harder to take you both. Another thing I was taught as a child, if someone put me in a trunk, to pull on the wires so the break lights go out (I think most newer cars have trunk release inside, but olders ones do not) some cops will pull over a car if taillights are not working.

I tell you what I do to help protect my children, my 12 yr old is in TaeKwonDo, and my 4 month old will start as soon as he can walk! I want them always to be able to protect themselves. The Master is great, he teaches them things you'd never think of, like, what if your sitting at the playground and a bully won't let you stand? He teaches you how to move back and postition yourself to stand, and things such as this. And he goes over what to do if someone tries to grab you. If someone ever tried to grab my 12 yr old they would be in for a surprise! I think all children should learn some sort of martial arts.
 
christine2448 said:
Great tips...also, if they are on a bike or walking w/a bike to hold onto it, it's harder to take you both. Another thing I was taught as a child, if someone put me in a trunk, to pull on the wires so the break lights go out (I think most newer cars have trunk release inside, but olders ones do not) some cops will pull over a car if taillights are not working.

I tell you what I do to help protect my children, my 12 yr old is in TaeKwonDo, and my 4 month old will start as soon as he can walk! I want them always to be able to protect themselves. The Master is great, he teaches them things you'd never think of, like, what if your sitting at the playground and a bully won't let you stand? He teaches you how to move back and postition yourself to stand, and things such as this. And he goes over what to do if someone tries to grab you. If someone ever tried to grab my 12 yr old they would be in for a surprise! I think all children should learn some sort of martial arts.
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My son is 8 and also in martial arts. They do some work like you have described but not enough. They have to learn how to get to their feet even if 3 or 4 people are trying to keep them down. How to work their way out of being pinned down....and best of all what the vulnerable spots to go for are eyes, bridge of nose, throat, solor plexus, groin, back of the knee, stomp on the foot etc.... (they can't really practice these on each other but it's still good knowledge to have). I don't know if he would be brave enough to defend himself with what he has learned but hopefully survival instinct would kick in and he would use some of what he has learned to try to break free from another persons grip and run.
 
I saw this on the 20th & watched it again here last night. I was even more disturbed the 2nd time. What were these people thinking? They looked and then just casually walked away. Can you imagine if it had been a real abduction? How could they live with themselves. I hope those who were caught on tape blindly going on with their busy lives will reflect on this & get a clue.

My only fear is that child predators will learn from this as well. Look how easy it would have been to get this kid in a car, on a busy street, in broad daylight.
 
My students LOVED this experiment! We talked about it in class and how racial boundaries may or may not have played a part. (The three guys who did intercede were not white, while the girl and "abductor" were.) It was a good way to discuss cultural differences and mores. My white students admitted that they wouldn't have gotten involved; while my black students said they would have. My Mexican students said they weren't sure what they would do. (For my Mexican students it seemed divided along legal vs. illegal immigrants. The illegal immigrants were afraid to get involved for fear of being deported.)
(Before someone asks how I worked this into an English class, we had just finished our study of Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience." Thoreau believed one could serve the state with one's body, mind, and/or conscience. We also discussed which one of those methods individuals were using.)
 
I can't say that I was really suprised by this segment at all. It reinforced my own experience of years ago. when I was 15 I was at a mall about 6 pm at the bus stop waiting for a bus to go home. The mall parking lot was busy with shoppers going in and out. It was winter , dark, cold and snowy. While waiting for the bus I noticed a young child about 2 or 3 walking barefoot around the parking lot. No adult with him. I watched for a few minutes as tons of adults walked around him , took notice and kept on going. Finally, I had had enough and even though I would miss my bus and get iinto trouble with my parents I decided to apporach the child. I got the baby to go with me and took him in the mall to mall security. I gave a statement to police and about a half hour later the boys parents were located in the mall. Each parent thought the baby was with the other parent. I don't know why no one else helped the boy. It turned out he was only 2 years old. I at 15 and 4 ft 5 inches and not even 100 pounds got involved because I felt I had too. I don't know why others don't feel that way. so watching this video really didn't suprise me at all.

mjak
 
there was a famous psychological study done many years ago about a situation where a woman was getting assaulted on the street and she was screaming, people were looking out of their windows but supposedly, no one did anything... and i think she was murdered. there is a name for this type of behavior (or the study itself?) but it escapes me at the moment.
i just call it people being "sheeple".

people just usually do what everyone else is doing- if they don't see anyone else reacting, then they won't either. i think the whole thing starts with "not wanting to get involved"--maybe stemming from a survival tactic- that you don't want to get dragged in and thus hurt (or killed) yourself. that's my theory anyway.

but if i ever see or hear anything amiss-- i make a point to say or do something about it. i'm usually the only one though!
 
reb said:
there was a famous psychological study done many years ago about a situation where a woman was getting assaulted on the street and she was screaming, people were looking out of their windows but supposedly, no one did anything... and i think she was murdered. there is a name for this type of behavior (or the study itself?) but it escapes me at the moment.
i just call it people being "sheeple".

people just usually do what everyone else is doing- if they don't see anyone else reacting, then they won't either. i think the whole thing starts with "not wanting to get involved"--maybe stemming from a survival tactic- that you don't want to get dragged in and thus hurt (or killed) yourself. that's my theory anyway.

but if i ever see or hear anything amiss-- i make a point to say or do something about it. i'm usually the only one though!
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Well that can happen, people not doing anything to help...but sometimes the opposite is true too. People try to help and the authorities do nothing but make you feel like a pest for sticking your nose in.

For several years when I was a single parent I didn't have much money and I lived in a rather bad neighborhood.... Lots of rental houses full of underage renters drinking, drug selling, thefts and one habitual wife beater, lots of kids dirty and running around without supervision half the time. I called the police every time I heard anyone being beaten or threatened and it was about once a week or so in the summertime (in the winter it's just too darn cold to be outside so not as much happened where I could see or hear it).

Anyway, often I would be awoken at night by yelling or screaming or some other ruckus. Many is the time I locked my doors and dialed the phone because I would hear a woman getting beat up by her husband and the kids yelling at him to stop or toddlers outside at 2 am crying as the adults drank on the front lawn and threatened or fought with each other. One of them came pounding on my door hollering at someone that it was his uncle's house and he knew he could borrow a gun from his uncle. It was very scary.

Every time I called the police did come....but they never did anything except to tell people to keep it down. It was maddening. The neighbor man actually admitted to the police to hitting his wife and knocking her down and they didn't do anything to him. They came to the one party that was way out of hand no less than 3 times in one hour (I wasn't the only one calling the police either, 2 other neighbors also complianed) and each time the police told the people to simply keep it down. The homeowner was on probation and I heard them say to him that they didn't want to arrest him because they knew he would get into trouble for drinking. These people at this party were threatening to shoot each other just before the cops showed up and they had 2 year olds in diapers wandering around outside as cars came and went squeeling their tires in and out of the yard. I do not call for unimportant things but I do call if someone is in danger or screaming for help....obviously the police simply didn't give a damn and probably considered my calls a nuisance.

So far as I know none of the people who were commiting the crimes I witnessed was ever arrested or even taken away to cool off.

Once a man who came into my house, the dog cornered him and I managed to get him out simply by yelling at him. After he was outside he seemed confused and he tried to come back in the house and he became angry at me but I locked the doors....the police came and took him.....when I called later to see if he had been arrested they said no, he was just a drunk so they gave him a ride home.

An old man at the end of the street was hitting children with sticks and threatening them. Another time he was giving kids money (not sure why). When I spoke to police they said he was no problem just a crazy retarded man, just tell the kids to stay away and ignore him.

I got pretty jaded about becoming involved after that....however I would still not watch a child being abused or abducted without trying to do something.
 
Reb, I seem to recall something like that done years ago with domestic violence because it had escalated so bad probably not the one you're talking about but they are similar to me the same as people not getting involved or reporting child abuse. I really like the experiment you did Pandora and I think this kind of education would go a long way if it were introduced into the schools like a program I was reading about in Alabama I think where they were working in the elementary schools to teach children precautions about child abduction.

In many cases no matter what your race people respond differently for different reasons and sometimes it's how you are taught at home or your home environment that triggers a reaction. Sometimes just a call to 911 is all it takes without being involved. All of these situations are valuable life skills that could at least be viewed and discussed in classrooms to better inform and educate our children in all age groups imo.
 
reb said:
there was a famous psychological study done many years ago about a situation where a woman was getting assaulted on the street and she was screaming, people were looking out of their windows but supposedly, no one did anything... and i think she was murdered. there is a name for this type of behavior (or the study itself?) but it escapes me at the moment.
i just call it people being "sheeple".

people just usually do what everyone else is doing- if they don't see anyone else reacting, then they won't either. i think the whole thing starts with "not wanting to get involved"--maybe stemming from a survival tactic- that you don't want to get dragged in and thus hurt (or killed) yourself. that's my theory anyway.

but if i ever see or hear anything amiss-- i make a point to say or do something about it. i'm usually the only one though!
Click to expand...

I can't come up with names right now but I remember this happened in early to middle 1960's. I think it was in New York.

It was horrible. The young woman was being attacked (stabbed) in tne early morning hours. The attack went on for a long time and several people heard her and looked out windows etc. but no one did anything to help, not even call police!

At one point the attacker left for a bit, then came back to finish her off with the last deadly stabbing. If someone only would have called police she could have been saved.

I'm just going by memory,( I was a teenager when it happpened and have read about it since, but it's been quite awhile) so may not have all the facts totally right but that's basically what happened.
 
montana_16 said:
I can't come up with names right now but I remember this happened in early to middle 1960's. I think it was in New York.

It was horrible. The young woman was being attacked (stabbed) in tne early morning hours. The attack went on for a long time and several people heard her and looked out windows etc. but no one did anything to help, not even call police!

At one point the attacker left for a bit, then came back to finish her off with the last deadly stabbing. If someone only would have called police she could have been saved.

I'm just going by memory,( I was a teenager when it happpened and have read about it since, but it's been quite awhile) so may not have all the facts totally right but that's basically what happened.
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I believe the woman's name was Kitty Genovese. I'm not entirely sure, but I think that's close. I was a kid at the time (10 or under) and I remember being horrified that no one helped her. What a horrible way to die...
 
That video was horrifying! I have coached my kids over and over about what to do if someone is trying to abduct them, and one thing I include in what I am saying to them is to scream as loudly as they can, and to yell "help!! He's not my dad!!", or "she's not my mom!!". It never occured to me that the child could look like they are just being bratty. After seeing that video, and seeing the little girl do exactly what I tell my daughters to do, I wonder what DO we tell them to do? Scary!
 
natasha-cupcake said:
I believe the woman's name was Kitty Genovese. I'm not entirely sure, but I think that's close. I was a kid at the time (10 or under) and I remember being horrified that no one helped her. What a horrible way to die...
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Yes, natasha-cupcake, That's her name. I feel bad for even forgetting it. Poor little young woman. I'm pretty sure she almost made it to where she might have been saved but didn't because she got no help.
I remember the whole country being horrified back then also. I was only a young teenager but remember being heart-sick over it as were my parents and everyone else.
 
Mitty said:
That video was horrifying! I have coached my kids over and over about what to do if someone is trying to abduct them, and one thing I include in what I am saying to them is to scream as loudly as they can, and to yell "help!! He's not my dad!!", or "she's not my mom!!". It never occured to me that the child could look like they are just being bratty. After seeing that video, and seeing the little girl do exactly what I tell my daughters to do, I wonder what DO we tell them to do? Scary!
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Well I think they should yell as many things as they can. But, instead of just "Help" or "He's not my dad"....which in my opinion made the kid just look like she could just be being bratty....and the man was only holding her by one elbow and walking her along and she never said as much as "ouch" I think it just didn't look convincing to the passers by.

My ideas....

#1 Tell your child to drop to the ground and kick and struggle force the person to drag them along...don't just let the person march you along on your own 2 feet.

Tell your child to say things that will get a stronger response from passers by and to scream loudly and to show their pain and fear plainly to people. If you can make eye contact look directly at the passers by and appeal directly to them. Don't stop yelling even if the man threatens you or tells you to shut up.

"Help me, he's hurting me"
"Help me, call 911"
"Help me, I don't know this man"
"Help me, call the police"
"Help me, this man is going to kill me"

even yelling "ouch" or "owe, that hurts" makes the adult look bad instead of making the child look bratty....IMO

Practice this with them if possible.

In my opinion not many people will ignore the situation if a child says any or all of the above as someone drags them down the street....or if they believe they are watching a child be actually physically hurt.

Some people will always be afraid however...I mean the guy could have a gun or knife and blow you away if you tried to stop him....but a person can at least follow and try to attract attention of aid or get the liscence plate number.

Usually if one person takes notice more people are comfortable with joining in to help.
 
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