Comment by Galen on October 12, 2009 at 5:37am

Oh, but Tiki, they would've been late for church if they'd stopped to help you! We can't have that! Why, if they were to walk in late because they stopped to help someone, how would the other blue-haired old battle-axes look upon them? "Hmph! That Mary Margaret Stewart coming in late to church! Who does she think she is?!" "I tell ya sister, I always knew there was something wrong with that family!"

Church - BAH! Even when I was at my most devout, I only attended a weekly youth group. I've never attended church and never would. If God came down from the clouds right now and personally saved my ass like the apostle Paul, you might find me preaching like a madman on TBN, but you wouldn't find me in a fucking church. Those are pretty much the most evil places on earth!

I'm sorry, I got off on a rant. Point is, nobody would DARE spend that Sunday morning time doing something to actually HELP people. No, they'd rather sit in church and go over their dumbass prayer list so they can feel like they're helping without actually having to do a damn thing.

Comment by Nix Manes on October 12, 2009 at 9:59am

This is a well-known problem, and caused a very famous experiment to be undertaken in the 1970s about this issue. Known now as simply "the Good Samaritan experiment," is showed that even Princeton seminarians didn't stop to help someone in trouble very often either.

The scientific details of the experiment can be found on the website of Augusta State University.

One of the conclusions written by the authors of that experiment, John M. Darley and C. Daniel Batson, is that "a person not in a hurry may stop and offer help to a person in distress. A person in a hurry is likely to keep going. Ironically, he is likely to keep going even if he is hurrying to speak on the parable of the Good Samaritan, thus inadvertently confirming the point of the parable. (Indeed, on several occasions, a seminary student going to give his talk on the parable of the Good Samaritan literally stepped over the victim as he hurried on his way!)"

There is a story on a website called The Situationist which you may find interesting on a book called The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. There is also an article which explores the study I pointed out. This website has a great deal of very interesting information about human behaviors (well, "interesting" if you are into this kind of stuff!).

Comment by Happy Tikiman on October 12, 2009 at 10:22am

@Galen what are you talking about? they are helping by putting money in that plate ;)

@nix That's awesome thanks. Even more of a reason of why christians shouldn't use the "we are morally right" case.

Comment by Prazzie on October 12, 2009 at 11:48am

Keith: If you were in Africa, they'd probably help you out - in exchange for your commitment to their god, of course.

I am in Africa and I can assure you, all it takes is a packet of cigarettes and you're sorted!

Tikiman, perhaps all those cars with Jesus fish stickers were stolen by Satanists.

Comment by Doug Reardon on October 12, 2009 at 7:22pm

Aw, cut them some slack, they were just hurrying to church so they could pray for you, and speed you on your way, and it must have worked cause their prayers were answered by the heathen that picked you up! God works in mysterious ways, his wonders to behold!

Comment by Frink on October 12, 2009 at 10:17pm

Ha, Keith wins the pithy wit award. :D

Comment by Galen on October 12, 2009 at 10:18pm

@Prazzie - I lived in South Africa for a year and there's no way in hell I'd stop to help somebody in Joburg, not for a whole cigarette factory! Damn tsotsis make it impossible to be so kind-hearted and trusting. I *never* walked around over there without a big knife in my pocket or, at the very least, my wife's bulldog on a leash!

Comment by Reggie on October 12, 2009 at 10:40pm

Like Neal alludes to, they were too afraid to stop and help. They go to church and are frightened silly by their shaman into believing that the world is full of wickedness and the end times draw nigh. This helps fill the collection plates and deprives a stranded atheists a ride home.

Comment by Galen on October 13, 2009 at 12:56am

That's probably it, Reggie. Between church and the media scaring the hell out of everybody and schools, parents, etc. raising kids since the 80s to be terrified shitless of "stranger danger"* it's no wonder people won't stop and help.

[ *fun fact - only 2% of all child abuse (including kidnappings) nationwide is perpetrated by strangers, according to Child Help USA and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. ]

Comment by Reggie on October 13, 2009 at 1:11pm

*fun fact - only 2% of all child abuse (including kidnappings) nationwide is perpetrated by strangers, according to Child Help USA and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Sort of like how most murdered women were killed by someone they knew, usually a husband or boyfriend or ex.

If they understood the statistics, they might be too frightened to go to church. Or home. Hehe.

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