Ok, it's not often that I vent on my blog, but this has been bothering me for a few days. M was out of town on business on Monday night. At dinner after picking him up from the airport he told a story which has really really bothered me about his character or perhaps societies lack of involvement.
Apparently on Monday M was at a restaurant where he witnessed a man overstepping the boundary of punishment to a toddler - under 2 year old. M saw this man spank the child - extremely hard. Ok, for some, spanking isn't bad and I also will let it go when I witness it happen. However, this man with the toddler then continued to spank the child many many more times because the child would not stop crying. Yanking the childs arm so the child is almost dangling off the ground and the man taking full swings to the childs butt, lower back and probably upper legs.
I asked M if he stepped in to say something and he said No. WHAT!!??? You're witnessing the abuse of a child and you did nothing? I then asked if anyone else in the restaurant did anything, and No, no one did anything. I then asked WHY he didn't step in, his reply: "Why? It's not going to change the behavior of that man. He's not going to change because I said something."
My blood turned HOT and I was angry. Have we become so self involved that we are no longer willing to help someone who needs it? Would people have stepped in if he was abusing an adult? Probably not because people don't want to become involved. And sometimes when they do, they end up getting physically hurt. As was the case of an attack in my neighboring city a few months ago. On a commuter train, some guys were harassing an old man, a woman stepped in to help and she had the cr@p beat out of her!!
It makes me sick that not one single person stepped in to help this child who clearly needed help. I told M that the LEAST he should have done was call 911 and report it to the police. And who knows, if someone did step in maybe that man would have changed his behavior. We have no idea how our reaction affects people. We hear stories all the time about an alcoholic who was given words of advice and suddenly they decided to get sober....it can happen. Or at least I'd like it believe that it can.
No comments:
Post a Comment