I agree that all too often, people turn their heads on situations. A very moving video for me was the dog who dragged another injured dog to safety through heavy traffic. That an animal would put itself at that much risk for a fellow dog was moving. That said, I still cannot agree that the woman in the OP in this thread did the right thing.drjoker wrote: I think the biggest problem in modern life is anonymity with a resultant lack of solidarity and a lack of sense of obligation to help your fellow man. How many of you know your neighbors' names? What about your neighbor's neighbors? How long have you lived at your present address? I want to capture that sense of community that NYC Jews and Muslims have, so I recently knocked on all my neighbors' doors and introduced myself. It's only been 2 weeks and it already has paid off. I saw a dog running loose and I recognized it as my neighbor's dog so I grab it and kept it in my house until the neighbor lady returned home. Another neighbor said that if he ever saw my house being robbed, he'd shoot the perps for me. I went away on a short trip and the lady across the street from me checked my mail for me (stacks of unchecked mail is a tip off to robbers that you aren't home). I suggest that you introduce yourself to your neighbors, too.
I don't believe, however, that feelings of community are dead. I agree with you that they are what we as individuals make of them. Let's think about some headline stories where there was a sense of community.
1. Todd Beamer and the other passengers on Flight 93, upon learning what had happened to the other hijacked airliners acted
2. The shoe bomber and the underwear bomber were both stopped by activists among the passengers. To a large measure, I think that Flight 93 was a wakeup call to everyone to ignore the submissive direction from government policy and many heard it.
We are very fortunate in having a neighborhood where neighbors look out for neighbors. The most anti-social one of them got his lawn mowed by neighbors when we found out that he was in the hospital with back problems. We constantly watch out for one another and a strange vehicle cannot come into our area without someone being aware of it. This is in sharp contrast to the last place we lived which was covered by an HOA. The feelings of distrust and the lack of community there was difficult to break down. We had great relations at that house with our immediate neighbors but it was no where near the sense of community that we have here. Another interesting paradox was that the property values in our old neighborhood were reasonably close while in our new one, they range from our 1,600 sq ft older home to a $1.6M estate on 10 acres just down the street. With some older homes like ours contrasting very large newer ones at twice to three times our appraised value, you would expect the neighbors not to socialize much. The opposite is true.
We have a long way to go to have a lot of people who would be willing to stand up as the young woman did in this thread. But the intention is there to be responsibly cultivated.
Despite my advanced years, I am one of those whose personal protection is restricted because of the lack of campus carry. For all of the rhetoric about college dorms and drinking, a couple of "minor" facts seem to keep getting over looked.
Never tried to use it, but he threatened them.