Complicity seems to be a common theme on a few blogs at the moment.
Juzzzy , ranfuchs and ParsleySage have all variously commented on :
The Lifelong Imprisonment and Rape of Children ; Starving a Dog for Art and Suicide Cult.
There was a seminal psychological study which might go some way to explaining the apparently counter-intuitive drive for people (collectively but also individually) to negate what is under their noses.
It was the Catherine Susan Genovese case of 1964.
She was murdered in Kew Gardens NY, by Mosely, a nutter who simply 'wanted to kill a woman' and had at least 2 stabs at the job in front of a fair few witnesses...
"For more than half an hour thirty-eight respectable, law-abiding citizens in Queens watched a killer stalk and stab a woman in three separate attacks in Kew Gardens."
When asked why he had continued with his attempts on her life when people were present, he replied 'Nobody ever does anything'.
He wasn't wrong either... was he ?
The widely accepted psychological hypothesis is that :
Since others are doing exactly the same, everyone concludes from the inaction of others that other people do not think that help is needed. This is an example of pluralistic ignorance and social proof. An alternative to explanations of rational motivation is that emotional cues to action can be as powerful as irrational ones, and the presence of a group of inactive others is a pre-rational emotional cue to inaction that must be overcome.
The bystander effect (also known as bystander apathy, Genovese syndrome, diffused responsibility or bystander intervention) is a psychological phenomenon in which someone is less likely to intervene in an emergency situation when other people are present and able to help than when he or she is alone.
Can't be arsed with links and punch-lines.
You're grown ups.
