One of my many day jobs is acting as a tour guide on horror and crime themed tours of my fair city. One of our tours, the Bloody Brisbane trail, talks about a particularly grisly murder. At around 4pm in a business office in Albert Street, in the centre of the city, a man discovered his secretary was moving to a new job, where he would no longer be able to pressure her into meeting his sexual demands. In a rage, he beat her savagely, tore off her clothes, raped her and then murdered her by throwing cleaning fluid in her face.
What was noted both then and now about the crime was that, according to witnesses, her screams were heard right across the busy CBD (then both a residential and working environment), up to a mile away. And when he'd finished, her killed walked out of the building covered in blood, with one of his fingers half bitten off from her struggles.
The suggestion made by the tour script is that most people are generally good natured. If you walk up to them and ask them for help, they will generally help. But they also assume, as part of their good nature, that someone else will help out of their good nature. Particularly in a big city. And most importantly, the more terrible the crisis, the more we assume someone else will help. Surely somebody is running to investigate that blood-curdling death scream?
The classic Milgram experiment found much the same thing. Yes, people kept pressing the button, sending shocks to the "victim", when ordered. What isn't usually mentioned however is that almost everyone who did so alerted the person giving the orders to their concerns and asked about the safety of the target. However, once they were assured that the survey organisers would take full responsibility and knew about the situation, they would continue pushing the button. Having cried "fire", they felt they had done their job. And indeed, we're told that that is the primary part of our duty - to alert people to the situation. As a child, we're told to tell a teacher or a parent or a policeman.
Of course, we're not usually told that this may do no good, and we have to keep telling until something is done.
The tour script concludes by suggesting that if ever you are in trouble, don't scream for help. Point to somebody or walk up to them and say "I need YOUR help". And if you see someone in trouble, help them or failing that, engage somebody else personally, by saying "THAT person needs YOUR help".
Where am I going with this? I'm going to politics, of course. We all like to believe that awareness is enough. That's the purpose of this blog, after all, to raise awareness (and vent hate, too, which is fun but ultimately masturbatory). That's also why we march in protest and write letters and call journalists. Once its in the paper, surely people will care? Once the crimes are known, surely they will stop? All it takes is awareness - if only the world knew, it would be okay. If only the media reported it more. If only the community understood the depths of depravity to which we have sunk. Then it would stop.
Except it doesn't. And we end up having newspapers reporting that it is the government's policy NOT TO REMOVE SHRAPNEL FROM CHILDREN because it costs money and hey, they're just worthless towelheads. And it's in the newspaper so surely something will be done? But no, it's like the blood-curdling scream - it's so incredibly horrible we assume even more it will be stopped (or we try even harder to assume it can't be that bad). And so it is never stopped and it only gets worse.
And the truth is, I don't know what the solution is. Yes, we can write to our MPs - point to them and say this is YOUR problem, fix it. But they too exist in a system where other people assure them the issue is being fixed. If enough of the public demand something is done, the government may act if they fear losing votes, but the democratic system rewards inaction and at the very best, change in teeny tiny increments. But even then, getting the public engaged at that level is terribly hard because things are so bad. We look at the Gordian knot and walk away.
Excuse me, I'm going to go read Watchmen again. Or chain myself to government house. Maybe both.
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