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Appearances can be very deceiving and domestic disputes are very difficult to figure out. I was involved in an incident once where a man was attacking a woman ... or appeared to be. It was at a festival in Addison several years ago at about 9:30 PM. My wife and I were walking back to our car which was parked in a grass lot with no lighting. There were several other people around also. As we neared our car, we could see and hear some sort of altercation taking place in front of us. Upon getting closer, we could tell that there was a young guy (mid 20's) struggling with a woman and yelling about his cell phone. My wife got out her cell phone and called 9-1-1 while I walked around the car that was between us and the wrestling couple. It was dark and we couldn't really see what was happening, so, rather than taking any physical action, I just said, "What's going on here?", expecting the woman to ask for help if she needed it. As soon as I spoke, the guy let go of the woman, stepped away from her and said something like, "I don't want any trouble here."

Now, I should probably mention that this guy was about 5'7" and thin, while I am 6'4" in boots and around 250 lbs. In the dark, I must have looked like a giant to him as he was acting like he was afraid that I was going to stomp him into the dirt (not much chance of that, I'm no fighter). I talked to him for several minutes while the woman ran and got into a car parked nearby. I was hoping that I could distract the guy while the woman left, but no such luck. She was waiting for him! It turns out that they were a couple, got into an argument and she had thrown his cell phone somewhere in the grass in the parking lot. Since it soon became obvious that she was not going to leave without him, I helped him find his phone (took about 3 minutes since I always carry a small flashlight) and he got in the car with her (she was driving) and they left. We reported it to 9-1-1 anyway.

Now here's the part of this that REALLY bothered me. When I walked up on this scene, there were at least 5 other people just standing nearby and watching! Kinda like the other two people watching in the Bartender video, no-one wanted to get involved, but they DID want to watch. I can't stand by and let someone get assaulted if they really want help and I can't understand the mentality of those who are able to just watch an attack without even calling for help.

I have often wondered if she eventually left the guy or if this situation finally escalated to the point where one of them (or both) ended up in the hospital. Or morgue.

And if their "friends" just watched.