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Reverend James Squire

The Bystander Effect



Photo by Priscilla Fraire


There was an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer (October 17, 2021), “Septa: No one stopped rail rape.” by Stephan Salisbury. The subtitle is “Woman was assaulted on the Market-Frankford Line and no passengers called 911.” It was a relatively short article that deserved to be on the front page and not buried with the rest of the paper as it raises a relevant ethical issue that informs both our personal and political decision making or lack thereof.


“There were a lot of people in my opinion that should have done something,” Police Superintendent Timothy Bernhardt said. It speaks to where we are in society and who would allow something like that to take place. It is troubling.” The article made a point that had there been an intervention that the person attacked would not have sustained rape and injury.


The interesting thing about this scenario is the police certainly focused on the attacker when viewing the surveillance video. But they focused on the passengers as well to gain some clue as to why no one responded.


Why didn’t anyone intervene? This failure to act to be helpful is something that has plagued experts for years. There is a classic ethical case that helps to understand why no one stepped forward. It is also the reason that the current article speaks to what is happening in society in general and political life in Washington today as well. It is the reason that it should have been on the front page.


I taught the case study, “The Murder of Kitty Genovese”, to students in my ethics classes. It always generated a great deal of discussion. The case study is not simply about a “failure to intervene” but also a failure in journalism ethics where reporters for The New York Times wrote an article in 1964 that was inconsistent with the facts of the matter. The Times called its own reporting flawed on this event in 2016 indicating a “grossly exaggerated number of witnesses were included in the story and what they saw.” That would be a subject for another blog.


Here is what we know. On March 13, 1964, Genovese was stabbed outside her apartment building. A number of residents within the apartment building witnessed the attack and did nothing. The incident is contained in many ethics’ textbooks over the last four decades after the attack occurred. That is because it is such an extreme example of the lack of action to help Kitty Genovese. It is sometimes referred to as the “Genovese Syndrome.”


When people from the apartment were interviewed later, one theme that surfaced was that EVERYONE THOUGHT THAT SOMEONE ELSE WOULD CALL 911. Passing the buck was a key part that led to inaction.


The people in the apartment didn’t realize what I taught in my ethics’ class. Not to decide to do something is to make a decision just as important as deciding to act. THERE IS NO ETHICAL NEUTRAL GROUND. Not passing the buck became one of the key reasons that honor codes in colleges are challenging as you are not only required to avoid unethical acts, but you must turn in people who you see doing something dishonorable. My students agreed that was a difficult thing to do.


The story of the Good Samaritan in the Bible is a story that needs to be part of our national conscience as well as a response of “yes” to the biblical question of “Am I my brother’s keeper?’


We have become a “Culture of Convenience”. Peter Salovey, president of Yale University, had a copy of his address to the class of 2020 included in an edition of Yale Alumni Magazine. He did an analysis of why and why not people would help someone in need. The jumping off place for the study was the story of the Good Samaritan. The story is a familiar biblical narrative where the person who we would least suspect to help someone is the person who comes forward to assist the man who is in need on a roadside.


The study concluded that those who don’t help are not bad people. They had just busier schedules. Ninety percent of those in the study did not stop to help. Only ten percent helped the person. The question the study raises is, “Are we too busy to help our neighbor?”


Other studies indicate that the closer you are physically to a person, the more likely you will intervene. Certainly, people on the Septa train were close enough. We should note that Al Gore’s book on climate change is an Inconvenient Truth. And it is just that.


I think that this is the reason so many Republicans in Washington are trying to distance themselves regarding the Insurrection. When they are put on the spot by someone who asks if they believe that Biden was elected President, they engage in fancy footwork such as Steve Scalise responding by not responding to the question, but bringing up the perception that certain states did not go through proper procedures. It is amazing to watch as excuses abound!


Trump is the master of changing the narrative that doesn’t fit his distorted view of reality by proclaiming that the Insurrection never happened. It was a friendly group of tourists who were present, the big lie that goes hand in hand with his original Big Lie.


Can you think of any event during the post Insurrection where the Republican Party inconvenienced themselves for our nation? They are giving credence to David Callahan’s study in his book, The Cheating Book. In summary given a choice between integrity and money, power, or getting reelected, politicians will always choose money, power, or getting reelected over integrity. Losing an election is a major inconvenience as well as you have to restart your life.


Can you imagine Trump inconveniencing himself to help another who is in the same location as him? I can imagine Biden doing it. There is a security camera footage that captures Biden in a men’s room when he is approached by a man who asks him for money. Biden doesn’t say a thing. He just leaves the men’s room. He returns and hands the person in need a piece of paper and states, “Call that number. I just called someone who will give you a good job. Call today!”

Not to act is to act. No neutral moral ground in ethics. That too is an inconvenient truth.

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