The Responsibility Project^®. Exploring what it means to do the right thing

Driven to Ignorance?

60 Comments

June 9, 2008 by Kathy McManus

Hit and Run: Without a Compass If a picture is worth a thousand words, how many are needed to describe the video of a man being struck by a hit-and-run driver and left to bleed unaided in the road, while numerous motorists and pedestrians casually maneuver around him and continue on their way?

Two, according to the blaring newspaper headline in Hartford, Connecticut, where the horrific incident took place: “SO INHUMANE”

At 5:45 on a recent Friday evening in plenty of remaining daylight, 78-year-old Angel Torres was crossing a street in a working-class Hartford neighborhood when he was struck by one of two cars driving recklessly across the center line.

The impact—caught on a streetlight surveillance camera--flipped Torres into the air, then sent him crashing to the pavement. As Torres lay in the road bloodied and paralyzed, the surveillance tape shows approximately nine motorists slowing to have a look at him, then driving away.

Other people are seen on the tape staring from the sidewalk or venturing into the street. Though it was later reported that several witnesses called 911, none of the gawkers halted traffic or aided the severely hurt Torres. Approximately a minute and a half after the impact, a police car arrived. Torres was taken to a hospital in critical condition, paralyzed from the neck down.

“We no longer have a moral compass,” said Hartford’s shocked and angry police chief, after releasing the surveillance tape in hopes of identifying the hit-and-run driver. But the tape—capturing the inaction of so many bystanders—also caught the attention of outraged Americans, who swamped blogs, message boards, radio shows and more, wrestling with the same inconceivable question: Why didn’t anyone give more help to Angel Torres?

Tell us what you think: Is there any acceptable reason not to have helped Angel Torres, or anyone else in a similar situation? Do you think the people seen on the tape have been misunderstood? What would you have done?

60 Comments

What do you think? Leave a comment

• June 10, 2008 by craig gordon

  I am a New York City public school teacher, and my philosophy class has expressed their disappointment with "those Hartford (expletive)." Many expressed certainty that they would have helped immediately.

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  • October 31, 2010 by Leonard Cook

    I see a steady erosion of our country away from good samaritanism, ever since Jesus lost his place in our society.

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• June 11, 2008 by Pattie Morgan

  Hartford's police chief is "spot on" - we have lost our moral compass. To not give aid was reprehensible. Unless the blood, etc., rendered me physically unable to give some help, I would have at least tried to give the man some aid.

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• June 17, 2008 by Sally O'Brien

  It is so easy for us to judge the onlookers as inhumane, but more importantly why did they not get involved? What stopped them from bending down to give aid? I worked with a woman who gave her neighbor CPR. She was commended by Mayor Perez but this good deed did not make the news. Good people of all races are out there; we need to keep encouraging the best in one another. Keep your eyes open and you will see Hartford can be a caring place. It is too bad for the Torres family compassion was not present the morning of their father's tragedy.

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• July 1, 2008 by C Chapman

  Did this happen because people today are fearful of getting involved, unsure of what the consequences will be if they take a role in such a situation? "Could I catch something if I help this person? Will I get in trouble if I don't give the right kind of help? Will the police think I was the perpetrator if I help this person? Will I get hurt if I step into the street, too, what if the other cars don't stop? Will other people get mad at me if I stop traffic?" Could it be similar to the fear one feels when passing by a homeless person begging at the roadside? "Maybe if I ignore this, I can pretend it doesn't exist and I can't be hurt by it" - mistrusting the truth of their need or not thinking about the feelings and person behind that sign. Or, perhaps did this happen because people's lives have been so overtaken by technology - with our cell phones, ipods, handheld game players, portable computers, etc - that we have become so disassociated with the people physically adjacent to us we tune out from what our roles could/should be? It's like we are toddlers, parallel playing, rather than interacting. If you saw such an incident as this hit-n-run, would your first thought be to make a telephone call - to 911 or maybe even to some special person in your life, to tell them the awful experience YOU just had witnessing such an event, rather than realizing that there is action that needs to be taken? Or, did this happen because we have a lack of examples to teach us what we could/should do in such an event? We have plentiful exposure to images in media and the movies about professional responders - police, fireman, medical personnel - or of people rushing to the aid of people they know, but perhaps not enough exposure to basic scenarios that help us view ourselves as capable enough to be first responders. It seems we need more "what would you do if..." discussions - over coffee, at church, around the dinner table, in the conference room, wherever. Hopefully that would at least result in the consensus that one should stop traffic and at least communicate with the injured person to reassure him help is on the way. Of course, it was a shocking trauma that occurred. It is easy to second guess the actions that happened there that day, but alas I was not there. I hope that in a similar situation I would be able to keep my wits about me and do the right thing.

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  • February 25, 2009 by HB

    Hi C.Chapman- Thank you for replying with a logical, well-thought out and completely analyzed response. I really commend how you worded the hypothesis that you suggested as the possibilities and how you realize that no one can judge but can only say that they HOPE that given a similar scenario, they would act differently. Thank you for providing a very coherent explanation of the scenario. Thank you for thinking in a way that, unfortunately, is not very common in our society and that is LOGICAL, NONJUDGMENTAL, COMPASSIONATE, using HYPOTHESIS TESTING, etc.

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• July 7, 2008 by joshua scott

  Who would do such a thing? Leaving a man in the street to die after you just hit him. The person who did this should be put a jail and should have to pay Torres medical bills.

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• July 21, 2008 by Jenn

  I have had to make that decision of whether or not to help an injured person in the street. I live in busy Southern California and it was around the same time of day that this accident occurred. It was a very drunk man on a bicycle who rode into the middle of the street and fell over, hitting his head pretty bad. I stopped my car and went to the man who was bleeding from the head. My mother got out and directed traffic and asked someone to call 911. It was just common sense and decency. The ambulance and police arrived shortly and we were on our way. There were several cars stopped and some bystanders helped get the man's bike off to the side of the road. It wasn't something I even needed to stop and think about. He was a person lying in the middle of the road. I would want someone to help me or my family. We have a responsibility to one another as human beings and as a society. I just can't believe how those people acted.

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• July 24, 2008 by Scott Murray

  It's called diffusion of responsibility. The assumption, basically, that it's someone else's job. And as moved as I am to know that New York City public school philosophy students are sure they would have acted differently, it's actually not always that easy to know when you should do something and when you shouldn't. I'm not talking about the driver who hit this guy, obviously. But "it was later reported that several witnesses called 911" and "approximately a minute and a half after the impact, a police car arrived." I can only hope if I get hit by a car the police come that fast. I think it's laughable that we would point at this situation as evidence of 'no longer' having a moral compass. The human race hasn't actually changed that much in ... a long time. And we do much worse things. This situation is par for the course. Not even that bad, relatively speaking. Ok, I'm a cynic, I guess. Does anyone else feel like this is getting blown a little out of proportion?!

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• July 24, 2008 by Jenn

  Someone stated that this may be getting blown out of proportion, but I don't agree. It would have been different if this man had been hit on a dark, deserted road, but he was hit in front of a bunch of people who just stood around and stared at him. He very easily could have died and all those folks would have just watched instead of lifting a finger to help. I know firsthand that making the decision to help is a no brainer.

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• July 28, 2008 by celeste

  Diffusion of responsibility is right. It is a concept that has been heavily studied by sociologists. Basically, you are safer and more likely to be helped if something happens to you when you are with very few people. In diffusion of responsibility, everyone wonders what someone else will do about it. Sad, but it's proven human nature. I'm not saying it was right or that they were less responsible for helping him -- but it is well documented that if you are in a huge crowd, people are more likely to stand there and you are less likely to be helped, at least in a direct manner.

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• August 8, 2008 by Master

  As I read this, I thought, "I would just go stand there, waving automobile traffic around him, and call 911. This seemed the obvious action to me. We are told on TV and radio, "DON'T move an injured person!" because the person might be injured, severely, by uneducated movement of his body. But stand there waving away other cars?---easy! Some time back, at a club party, I was talking with someone when two large paintings were accidently knocked off the wall behind us. We got up, I checked the scene and started telling people how to help me, everyone else staying out of the way. The problem was corrected, the club owner none the wiser (no damage occurred), in less than two minutes. I had never seen this problem before, and knew nothing of the situation---I just did what I needed to do. My brother was telling me about "How to be an Alpha Male" books he was reading. He had decided to forget about the idea, and just be himself. As he talked, I realized a fake alpha-male would have just stood there looking at the paintings wondering when someone (someone else that is) would repair the situation. At the time, I thought my action perfectly normal. I mention all this because we, in the U. S. anyway, are constantly being bombarded with "do this!" and "do that!" commands from just about every direction. This means most people will, unknowingly, wait for "the appropriate command" before they do something, not realizing, in this instance, the command has to come from within themselves. I lived in a bad part of San Francisco. I was using a large push cart with milk-crates on it. As I got to the other side of the street, a front wheel hit a big hole in the pavement. The push cart stopped on a dime, but the milk-crates did not. There were LPs and videocassettes just about everywhere it seemed. People who had crossed at the same time stopped to put things in the crates and put the crates back on the cart. So, it depends on the situation, big or small, easy to understand or not, and of course, what is the risk of doing something wrong? I have zero medical ability. My possible benefit to him: Zero. Probability of damaging him: Very high. Cost to him of damage from my 'help': Extremely high. Conclusion: Don't touch. I have a cell phone. I can call 911. Probability of damage to him from my using the cell phone: Zero. The benefit to him if I use the phone: Extremely high. The cost to me to use the phone: Nearly zero. Conclusion: Telephone the 911 system. I do not "think" all this, it happens completely automatically. As an engineer, I deal with risks and probabilities very frequently. This situation and that of the paintings calls for Critical Thinking. Critical Thinking has, I believe, been dropped from the few college curricula which required it. Critical Thinking should be taught all through grade- and high-school! I APOLOGIZE! THE FORMATTING COMMANDS REFUSE TO WORK (according to the preview)!! I have the original, in case you would like a copy of it e-mailed to you.

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  • April 27, 2009 by jamie

    I know that to move an injured person is the wrong thing to do but simply going over to the person and letting him know that you are there with him till help arrives can be very helpful. I have worked in ems for a few years now and find it amazing what a little hope and compassion can do for someone in a bad situation like that. I also know that people just don't want to take time out of there busy lives to help another person especially if it might be some one they think they are better than. I see that kind of behavior every day on some of the calls and it makes me sick.

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• December 20, 2008 by pam tabbutt

  I'm not sure what you think people should have done. The people driving should have slowed down and stopped, at the very least the person who hit the man. If this was a freeway, it may not have been that easy. The people on the side of the road were at even less of an advantage. Did you want them to run into the roadway and also get hit? They did what they could do and that was call the cops. It's a dangerous world out there and if nobody cared about the guy in the road, do you think they would care about the person running out to help him? Although I would have been silly enough to run out there and stop the traffic to help the guy, I wouldn't expect anyone else to be so foolish and think about the welfare of another over their own.

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• December 24, 2008 by Ted Daniels

  My grandfather was thrown from a moving car in France in 1919. He lay on the pavement, apparently knowing his neck was broken, as he asked the other passengers not to move him. They ignored his request and killed him. These were medical personnel, as the story goes, though it seems none were doctors. Calling 911 in this instance was certainly an appropriate response. The man was, we're told, already paralyzed. Over-eager ignorant assistance might have resulted in an outcome similar to that my grandfather encountered.

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