ipl-logo

The Bystander: The Horrific Murder Of Kitty Genovese

880 Words4 Pages

The day was March 13, 1964 when local residents of Kew Gardens neighborhood of Queens in New York City heard screams coming from outside late at night. “Oh, my god, he stabbed me! Please help me!” screamed Kitty Genovese as she was being stabbed to death. After many calls for help, a man finally screams and gets the attacker to flead, later to come back and kill her while 38 of her neighbors watched and did nothing. Not one person did anything and they let her bleed to death. This horrible tragedy should have never been let get to the extent that it did. What kind of a human being watches another’s life being taken away and does nothing. The devastating murder of Kitty Genovese was a great example of the bystander effect. What is the bystander …show more content…

After the brutal murder of Kitty Genovese a new phrase was created called “Genovese Syndrome” which is the phenomenon of others not trying to help when other people are around because they believe that someone else will help, therefore they are not obligated to help. Here are a few reasons on why I believe that this bystander law should be passed. To begin, imagine how many lives would be saved. Second, people should be punished for not helping if they have the capability to. Lastly, this law will encourage people to stand up and help. Even doing the bare minimum you can will surely help. You do not have to put yourself in danger to help, a simple phone call has the ability to save a great amount of …show more content…

"As people announced over time that this was going on, more people came to see, and some actually participated” said Lt. Mark Gagan of the Richmond Police Department. Not one of those 20 people that watched called for help. About 5 arrests were made but none of the people that watched were ever punished or prosecuted for not trying to help. This terrifying situation could have been stopped before it got to the level it got to if someone tried to help. If there was a law that could have people punished for this I am 100% sure this could have been prevented. A viral photo of an emaciated Sudanese toddler having trouble crawling to aid station for food while a vulture sits just a few feet behind her waiting for her to die. Kevin Carter, the photographer stood by for 20 minutes not doing anything to help the poor little Sudanese toddler that was very clearly struggling due to the little to no food she had. A few minutes later, Carter scared the vulture away and left the toddler to most likely die. Once the famous photo had been uploaded, Carter got a lot of backlash due to him not doing anything to help the poor toddler. Carter later came out with the statement that he was just there to show history being made, not to get involved. The photograph

Show More
Related

Who Was Responsible For The Murder Of Kitty Genovese

146 Words | 1 Pages

After a young lady, Kitty Genovese, was stabbed to death, it was found that there were about 38 witnesses to the stabbing but none of the people had tried to help Genovese in any way. Of the 38 witnesses, no one had even called the police (Darley & Latane, 1968). Researchers were curious as to why in emergency situations, bystanders do not help the person in need. They found that in Genovese’s situation, most witnesses saw that there were many others watching. The responsibility to help, and also the blame of not helping, was spread out amongst the witnesses.

Read More

Michael Dorman's The Killing Of Kitty Genovese

483 Words | 2 Pages

Americans today tend to believe that if they see a crime happening, they think someone has helped already or called 911 and, walk on. However this is not the case with “The Killing of Kitty Genovese” in 1964 by Michael Dorman, he is a freelance writer who published this to the Newsday Inc. This murder was an intriguing case of the bystander effect. The reason for this intrigue was there were 36 people who witnessed the murder but did nothing about it. The cops were not called until 35 mins after the murder, the response was 2 mins.

Read More

The Noble Prize By Elie Wiesel Summary

421 Words | 2 Pages

Some believe that bystanders are innocent, because they aren't the ones causing the pain. However they still witness what is going on around them, while watching others suffer. In “The Harvest Gypsies” John Steinbeck says, “The better dressed children shout and jeer, the teachers are quite often impatient”(John Sternbeck). This shows how just a little words and actions can affect people or add on to the problem. In “Killers of the Dream” Lillian Smith expresses, “Some learned to screen out all except the soft and the soothing; others denied even as they saw plainly and heard”(Lillian Smith).

Read More

Bystander Effect In Night

774 Words | 4 Pages

Every day many of us are faced with the question, “Should I step in and help?”. Some of us immediately think yes and jump in to help, while others believe it is better to keep walking. The bystander effect happens when a person does not stop and help because they think someone else will. In these situations, some people stand up and respond to the crisis, because they are not worried about what will happen to them, but what will happen to the person in crisis instead. In the novel Night and the poem “The Hangman”, the bystander effect took place because people were afraid to bring attention to themselves.

Read More

The Bystander Apathy Effect By Kitty Genovese

346 Words | 2 Pages

On a quiet early morning in 1964, Kitty Genovese was brutally stabbed and sexual assaulted. Thirty – eight of her neighbors heard her cries, screams for help and/or witnessed the attack from their windows and only one of her neighbor’s called the police; a half hour later. The fact that not one person intervene in a timely manner to save Kitty Genovese lead John Darley and Bibb Latane to conduct their own study “ The Bystander Apathy Effect”.

Read More

Examples Of Blinders In Night By Elie Wiesel

890 Words | 4 Pages

(Wiesel XIX) Bystanders cannot understand the pain the victims went through, so they choose to ignore the problem. They showed a preference to the comfort of blindness and

Read More

Kitty Genovese Case

519 Words | 3 Pages

As a result of the Kitty’s death the criminal justice system was implemented the Good Samaritan Law, the 911 call system and the neighborhood watch program. The nature in which the media reported in on Kitty’s death brought many to question the apathetic nature of the American society. For example the media reported that there were 38 witnesses who watched as Kitty was being killed and did not helped. It was later reported that it was possible that there were not 38 witnesses and none of the neighbors saw in

Read More

Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn T Call The Police By Kitty Genovese

892 Words | 4 Pages

None of her neighbors thought to call the police as she was being attacked. According to Martin Gansberg in his writing “Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn’t Call the Police,” the neighbors did not act in this case because they either “didn’t want to get involved” or they “went back to bed”(130,131). The neighbors were either too lazy or too tired to help this poor woman. As a result, her attacker was able to return three different times in order to finish the crime. This is a case where remaining apathetic leads to a deadly consequence.

Read More

The Killing Of Kitty Genovese Research Paper

1047 Words | 5 Pages

Detectives investigating Genovese's murder discovered that no fewer than 38 of her neighbors had witnessed at least one of her killer's three attacks but had neither come to her aid nor called the police (Michael Dorman). This piece of information ties to the bystander effect, especially because it shows that amongst the large group of bystanders (her neighbors), not one tried to stop or help the situation. Recent and past news events involving bystanders who witness but do not report or help victims in crisis have led concerned citizens in the state of California, and across the country, to lobby their state representatives to create stronger Good Samaritan laws. My own view is the state of California needs a new bystander law that would require an individual to report or assist another person in imminent danger or peril or face substantial fines, possible jail time, and/or both, if they can do so without putting themselves or others in danger because It will decrease crime since people will be less likely to commit crimes and hurt other people when they know someone will report it, if one person helps it means more people will be more likely to help

Read More

Bystanders In The Hangman

756 Words | 4 Pages

Every day many of us are faced with the question, “Should I help?”. Some of us immediately think yes and jump in to help, while others believe it is better to keep walking. The bystander effect happens when a person does not stop and help because they think someone else will. In these situations, some people stand up and respond to the crisis, because they are not worried about what will happen to them but what will happen to the person in crisis. In the novel Night and the poem “The Hangman”, the bystander effect took place because people were afraid to bring attention to themselves.

Read More

The Bystander Effect In Phycology Of The Holocaust

1179 Words | 5 Pages

The bystander effect is when people feel “not responsible” for something happening. This case is actually a main example of the bystander effect in action. They feel as if they are just minding their own business. Some feel like it would be unsafe to intervene and could hurt themself or get killed.

Read More

Bystander Behavior And Discourse Analysis

834 Words | 4 Pages

Bystander behaviour can generally be described as the actions people take when they witness an emergency situation in a public place. There have been many studies on bystander behaviour, this essay will explore two approaches to explain this behaviour. It will look at the experimental method performed by Latané and Darley and at the discourse analysis done by Levine. First the essay will describe and outline the methods.after that it will examine the similarities as well as the contrast between those techniques. Latané and Darley did their research on bystander behaviour in the aftermath of the murder case of Catherine `Kitty´ Genovese,which happened in the Suburbs of New York in 1964.

Read More

The Bystander Effect Theory

1263 Words | 6 Pages

The Bystander Effect: A Result of a Human Drive Repetitive cries and screams for help were heard in Kew Gardens, New York on the Friday night of March 13th in 1964. As the 28-year-old Kitty Genovese was approaching her doorstep, an attacker –Winston Moseley- came from behind and started to stab her repeatedly. Despite her loud calls for help, turning on the bedroom lights along the neighborhood is all what her calls were capable of. None of the thirty nearby neighbors wanted to go under the spotlight of answering the call of duty so it wasn’t before 20 minutes when the anonymous hero that lived next door decided to call the police. It was four years later when our victim’s story became the perfect example to explain the social psychological

Read More

Bystander Behavior And Discourse Analysis

1367 Words | 6 Pages

Both Latané and Darley 's use of the experimental method and Levine 's use of discourse analysis aim to gain insight as to why the bystander phenomenon occurs, and are interested in why humans seemingly go against their better nature and choose not to help others. (The Open University, 2015a) Latané and Darley 's(1970) cited in Byford, (2014, p.229) experiment consisted of a lab-controlled test and used their quantitative results in order to understand the bystander effect and concluded that people are significantly less likely to respond when in the “passive confederate condition” and most likely to respond when in the “alone condition.” Levine 's (1999) cited in Byford (2014, p.236) viewing of qualitative evidence meant that he was able to determine factors he felt led to the explanation of this effect, such as the examination of the Bulger case and others ' feeling as though they should not become involved in family matters. Both of these experiments were conducted in order to more clearly understand Bystander behaviour and the reasons

Read More

The Pros And Cons Of The Bystander Effect

1212 Words | 5 Pages

The word “help” is a very complicated yet simple word. According to the Learner’s Dictionary, the definition of help is: to do something that makes it easier for someone to do a job, to deal with a problem, to aid or assist someone. Helping someone sounds like an easy job, and most of us would agree that we would help people anytime anywhere, but it always doesn’t turn out that way. Scientists have spent a considerable amount of time studying the helpfulness behavior of several types of people. Picture this... a man lying on the floor and a few people strolling about, occupied with their business.

Read More

More about The Bystander: The Horrific Murder Of Kitty Genovese

Related Topics

Open Document