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'A small truck ran over a two-year-old girl' - This is argument essay


thaolam77 1 / -  
Nov 5, 2011   #1
When a small truck ran over a two-year-old girl named Wang Yue in Foshan, Guangdong Province of China, it stopped for a few seconds. Instead of getting out of the truck to check whether the girl was okay, the driver continued his course, running over the small body the second time with the rear wheels and driving away. She was lying on the street with her body bleeding, crying. Over the next seven minutes, another van drove over her again and 18 people walked or cycled by without helping her, or taking her to a hospital. A trash collector finally saw, moved her to the curb, and alerted her parents. The injuries were too damaging for Wang Yue to overcome, and she eventually died in the hospital a few weeks later. This heart-breaking story happened on October 13th, 2011. While reading this story, I felt angry at the selfishness, the carelessness, and the heartlessness of human beings. This event reminds me of a similar event that happened in the US, where no one came to assist a woman named Catherine Genovese (Kitty) when she was stabbed to death. ("Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police.") Catherine's neighbors did nothing to help her while she repeatedly screamed for help. These innocent deaths are a part of the ignorance of bystanders because they witness injustice without helping the victims. I think that Martin Gansberg's story reflects the real sign of treatment in our society because he pointed out the indifferent attitude toward the dying situations of "good people". Instead of preventing the problems, the similar events still have been occurred in our society because of the fear for one's own safety and the individual selfishness, especially when confronted with complicated problems.

The ignoring of Kitty's call for help in a deadly situation, and the ignoring of the two-year-old Wang Yue dying on the street reflect the selfishness of people who did not want to lend a hand. When seeing the baby's incident, my body was shaking and chill because of anger. I cannot believe in my eyes that there were eighteen people around in seven minutes, but no one was willing to help this pity girl. The ruthless is a young man walked parallel with the girl show no emotion when seeing her lying on the street. When the police interviewed him, he said that he did not see. Hearing his word, I just wanted to punch to his nose because of lie. How can he did not see this baby in the dying situation like this? A mother who was holding her daughter said that her daughter cried upon seeing this scene, so she used her hands to cover her daughter's face before going away. These remarks resemble those related to the murder of Kitty. Her neighbors did nothing when Kitty screamed, "Oh, my God, he stabbed me! Please help me! Please help me! " We just see that "From one of the upper windows in the apartment house, a man called down: Let that girl alone!" Although this man knew that she was stabbed, he did not act anything, such as run out to see how her wound was, call the police, take her to hospital, or take her home to dress the wound. Moreover, there were many windows opened at the second time when hearing the Kitty's shriek, "I'm dying! I'm dying!" Who opened these windows? Of course, we can know that it was her "good neighbors," and for what reason? What did these people do behind the opened window? Was that for watching clearly the scene?

People are reluctant to intervene in what seem to be dire emergencies because of the not-my-problem mentality. In people's minds, they probably thought that if they did call the police, it meant they would have to stay up all night and deal with the problem, or they also probably assumed that someone else would step out and call the police. In addition, Kitty's neighbors were afraid that if they helped her catch the killer, they would receive the revenge from others. It is easy to understand that if they did not get involved, no one would bother them. This kind of thinking made the people who witnessed the attack on Catherine Genovese act as cowards. They indeed displayed nothing but selfishness, and held partial responsibility of her painful death. Seeing such a horrible scene, a man who witnessed clearly this situation claimed that "I was tired, I went back to bed." While the other man sheepishly told the police," I didn't want to get involved." It was such a heartless people! This is the obvious attitude of apathy. It was not his problem, so he did not care for who would die, or who would survive. Or, in the baby's case, these 18 people walking and cycling past the scene just looked at the dying girl, then left as if nothing happened. Maybe they thought that the baby looked like a dead rat, or maybe they thought that since population was so high, one death would not matter that much. Perhaps they were afraid people would blame them, saying that they were involved in the situation that lead to the death of the baby. However, the unemotional and unforgivable reasons are selfish and apprehensive feelings that deeply embedded in the human nature. The anger toward unforgivable people is the neighbors who witnessed the murder and showed no emotional reactions.

Society's standards are going up, but the way people are concerned about one other goes down. We can see that the event of Genovese was taken place in the early morning of March 14, 1964 when there were many political events happened, such as the Vietnam War, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, and so on. People might claim the social situation at the time as reasons to not help others since they have not got involved into complicated problems any more, but after more than four decades, similar situations still occur when people live in peaceful societies. The selfishness still remains deep down inside. People, in Genovese's case, said that they were afraid. In the baby's case, the walking passersby were interviewed and said that they did not see this baby girl laying on street with her face bleeding or hear her crying. They just wanted to not be associated with the troubled situations.

People are less likely to act when they believe that others are capable of acting. In Kitty's case, it is obvious that after an old woman called police to come, all of the neighbors went out. Maybe, they waited for someone to volunteer first, and they would come after, or they simply thought that if they did not help, others would. Similarly, no one went out of their ways to help the baby girl. If human beings are inherently benevolent, why did 38 ordinary people did nothing when they heard Kitty crying for help? Why did 18 people walking and cycling by do nothing to help the little baby? They could have simply picked up the phone and called the police without putting themselves in danger, or they could have rushed the baby to hospital to save her life. Are we getting too indifferent or too frightened or too alienated or too self-absorbed to get involved in helping a neighbor in trouble? The fact is that people are usually afraid of getting their troubles when helping others. In our society, there are many people who take advantage of events to make money. This is the reason why people around the incidents refuse to lift a finger. For instance, a 70-year-old lady felt down on the street. Upon seeing her, a man helped her stand up. Instead of thanking to the man, the woman shouted out, and exclaimed that the man pushed her. She required the man to take her to hospital and pay all of the hospital bills. The police arrested him, or asked him about the incidence. Good Samaritans often are blamed for the very problems they try to help. As a result, no one dares to help.

Although most people do not like to get involved in other people's problems, their duties as citizens and human beings are to attempt to help or call the police if they notice someone getting attacked, or injured. As we can see, Catherine Genovese arrived home to her apartment building in Queens late one night. The man stabbed her three different times and left her to die. The police received not one single call until after Catherine died from her wounds while it only took them two minutes to arrive on the scene. If her neighbors joined together to help her, she would not die. In the little girl's incident, if 18 people who walked by were concerned about the baby by lifting her to the curb, or taking her to hospital, or if the first driver stopped the van, the baby could have had a chance to live; the second van did not have a chance to run over her one more time. There are many things that could have been done, but none of them turned into reality.

People, nowadays, are more concerned about their neighbors, but it is not enough because there are many similar situations to Genovese and Yue Wang happened everywhere. As human beings, we should raise our emotional awareness and moral standards in volunteer helping people without hesitation. We should be more and more involved in their neighborhood safety. It is difficult to put oneself in the position of any of these neighbors. While each of them had their own reasons for not calling when needed, they were not entirely blameless. As a society, we need to re-examine our values.

Please give me some ideas for conclusion also.
The topic is about agree or disagree with the author's point of view. I totally agree with the author's view.
Jhangir 1 / 3  
Nov 9, 2011   #2
Its called the bystander affect.


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