Have you ever heard of the Bystander Effect?
It’s the idea that you don’t help someone who might need it when you’re out and about. In fact, the more people that are around, the less likely you are to get involved. There are many barriers to action, some which are obvious and some of which aren’t. Here is a compilation of some of our most common barriers to being a positive influence in negative situations, along with a list of reasons to help.
Barrier #1: “It’s not my problem.”
It’s really easy when you’re tired or busy or distracted to shrug it off when you see a pretty obviously bad situation. If it doesn’t feel like it will impact you directly, it can be really hard to motivate yourself to interfere in a situation…especially if it’ll cause any discomfort. But I’m here to tell you that any sort of assault on our campus is indeed our problem. We create the culture on campus together, and this isn’t just within the Davidson bubble. People “on the outside” see what happens here. They hear the police reports, they see the news stories, and that affects the public’s view of our campus. We have the ability to control those stories and create a place where we feel safe by making questionable situations our problem.
Barrier #2: “I don’t know if it’s even a problem.”
Okay, if Olivia Pope can trust her gut, so can we. If something inside of you is causing you to question a scene playing out in front of you, listen to that. Take a minute to assess the situation instead of just ignoring it and walking away. Please, y’all, do not make assumptions based off of weird preconceived notions, take some time to see what is really going on. Of course, if your gut is telling you that it might be dangerous to interfere, please proceed with caution. Having a partner in (preventing) crime can make your interference safer, as can trying to postively affect the situation from a distance. And please, even while you’re listening to your gut… use a cool head and proceed rationally.
Barrier #3: “It’s not my place to interefere…”
We’re trained by social norms to not interfere. This could be attributed to our hatred of pass interference in football, but it is more likely the fact that “to interfere” is to be a nosy busybody. It’s obnoxious right? WRONG. Maybe interfering is annoying when your mom is asking you as a senior in college if you’ve done your homework, but if you see something wrong going down it is encouraged to please interfere (again, safely and rationally). The Davidson police would MUCH rather have you call in a questionable situation rather than let it escalate. Not only that, but if we don’t interfere in the small, moderately questionable problems, how do expect to interfere in the rarer, much more serious situations? Further, what does it say about our sense of community if we put our own social comfort over the safety of others. I’m not saying push into every conversation, or dig your nose into everyone’s lives, but if something seems really off, and you think you could make a difference – please take care of each other and interfere.
Barrier #4: “I don’t know what to do.” & “There’s nothing I can really do.”
Everyone can do something. If you feel like someone needs to be extracted from a weird social situation (i.e: you see the “who the hell is all up on me” eyes from a girl on the dance floor) you don’t have to do something drastic to fix it. Just go up and ask if she wants some water. We don’t all have to be Superman (and we don’t always have the relative physical resources to do so), but we can all distract, talk, and extract. Know yourself: if you’re better at talking to people, go up and become the third person in the conversation your friend looks like she wants to get out. Or maybe the situation is dangerous and you can’t get involved… so call the police. (Really, I promise, they’re more worried about preventing serious crime than busting you for underage drinking.)
Barrier #5: “Someone else will do it.”
False. It’s proven that the more people there are around a negative situation, the less likely they all are to intervene. They just place the burden on others and move on with their lives, even in obvious situations, like someone bleeding out on the sidewalk. “Eh, someone else will call 911.” We like to talk the talk about how we all take initiative at Davidson, so let’s prove it. We’re smart, we know rationally what to do, we just have to actually follow through. As soon as one person intervenes, it is more likely others will too (also proven!). If you’re that first person to intervene though, know that you’ll probably have to delegate tasks to specific people. Don’t, for example, yell out “someone call 911!” Point to one person and tell them “You! Call 911!” Exclamation points are obviously necessary in such situations.
Basically, Davidosn, I want to see us living out our commitment to creating a safe, secure, fun, campus culture and community. We’re doing one hell of a job right now, a lot better than many other communities, but let’s keep getting better…because as we all know, constantly pushing ourselves to be better is something at which we thrive.