By A.C. GRAYLING
Added: Wed, 01 Oct 2008 23:00:00 UTC

Reposted from:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/10/01/do0102.xml

When you see yobs bullying or beating someone up, should you go to the victim's assistance? News of Frank McGarahan's death at the weekend while trying to do just that prompts a mixed reaction: we admire his courage; but his tragic death adds to the fear that inhibits many people from helping others. Yet the answer to the question has to be an emphatic yes.

Of course, how you assist depends on circumstances. If there are 20 brutal thugs, one victim and you, assistance is best given by calling the police from a safe distance, and if possible taking photographs with your mobile phone. If there are three of you, and you see a couple of men attacking someone else, you can and should physically intervene.

For my own part, I think one should intervene even when the odds are against one. It's the principle of thing: a blow against wrong is never wasted. What no one should ever do is walk on by.

Some years ago, a woman friend of mine was attacked by a deranged individual on a crowded Tube platform. The attacker grabbed her by the hair, swung her off her feet, and then round and round. Not a single person did anything to help - though she screamed and begged them to do so. That was appalling.

Put yourself in the situation of a person in danger, under threat, and imagine how you would feel if you saw other people scurrying off because they were too nervous to help you. This thought alone should change anyone's mind who is determined to keep out of trouble even at the cost of someone else's safety.

In April this year, after two separate have-a-go deaths, DCI Cliff Lyons of the Metropolitan Police said that members of the public should intervene when they see yob behaviour. He recommended that they should do it sensibly, but do it anyway. If everyone was of this view, bystanders would club together and help each other in stopping yobs, profiting from safety in numbers.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has just published a report on what our contemporary society sees as today's social evils. Chief among them, according to the large-scale poll conducted, is a breakdown in the sense of community - which means, among other things, a reduction in our individual sense of mutual responsibility and concern.

This is certainly part of the picture. It is a self-feeding problem, because when fewer people feel that they have a direct responsibility to help others, the more isolated the Good Samaritans among them become; and the more isolated people are as would-be Good Samaritans, the less sure they feel about having a go.

That is not merely a regrettable but in a way a shameful fact. Other considerations would once have weighed with us: questions of honour, of a responsibility to defend what's right, of being more afraid of cowardice than injury.

No doubt such notions appear quaint now, and we are inclined to think that the person who turns away instead of having a go is not being cowardly but rational. The thugs might have a knife; they might fracture one's skull or rupture one's spleen or kidneys with their boots or baseball bats.

A beating is all too likely to be fatal if the stab or the kick lands in the wrong place. And thus it seems common sense not to get involved - one might be thinking of one's own family, too.

These are valid points. But the more of us who are persuaded by them to the point of doing nothing to help others, the more alone we each are should we ourselves be the victim. And when danger threatens, none of us should allow others of us to be alone.


For more on this story:
Murdered city banker Frank McGarahan: Three men arrested
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3110897/Murdered-city-banker-Frank-McGarahan-Three-men-arrested.html

Millionaire bank executive 'paid ultimate price' for being good citizen:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3110272/Millionaire-bank-executive-paid-ultimate-price-for-being-good-citizen.html

TAGGED: MORALITY