The kindness of strangers...

[martinlivings]

We went and saw The Dark Knight again [1] on Saturday night with Izz's parents. And once again, coming out, Izz complained about the people on the ferries not blowing each other up, and how it wasn't realistic. Which led to a discuss of whether people, in a crisis, do the right thing.

I think it's fair to say that, most of the time, they don't. Most of the time, people are stupid, selfish and cruel. They'll walk or drive right past someone being beaten up [2]. Men will dress up as women in order to escape a sinking ship. But occasionally, just occasionally, people will do the right thing. In the chaos of 9/11, the people of New York rallied against the terror that had flown into their city and destroyed two buildings. On that same day, a plane full of passengers sacrificed themselves to prevent another attack happening. At an airport in Glasgow some years later, a ordinary man walked up to a terrorist on fire and punched him out [3].

Sometimes, people do the right thing.

I'm so fucking proud of everyone!

[1] Don't ask... I wanted to see Hellboy 2, but it was on too late for the rest of the family... sigh...
[2] For example, on William Street in Northbridge, where I was mugged and beaten in broad daylight, with traffic whizzing past and people walking less than three meters from where I was being pounded... hmph!
[3] Of course, that could just be because it was Glasgow!

Comments

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Actually, I remember reading a pretty long article in New Scientist suggesting that actually, most of the time, people do the right thing in a crisis. That the New York sort of experience is the routine one. As long as most people generally have the idea that cooperation will help them survive, they can be remarkably helpful and useful - and it is a systemic weakness of civil defence and disaster relief kind of stuff that they underestimate the extent to which people are helpful and trying hard to do the right thing, and overestimate the extent to which they should be controlled and mistrusted.

The problem is that as soon as people think they are being discriminated against, lied to, or used, their cooperative altruistic stance is quite fragile. People quickly switch to hostility if they meet hostility. It is possibly all one of those aspects of human nature that appear to match game theory.

[ashamel.livejournal.com]

The interesting thing about that plot (other than whether or not it was realistic) was that it didn't rely on any actions by our hero, or any of the protagonists, to resolve.

Strangely, it reminds me most of The Killing Joke, which ends similarly, albeit it is more about the resilience of Gordon than the madding crowd.

[angriest.livejournal.com]

Except of course the Joker would've blown both of them up if the Batman wasn't there to beat him up.

[ashamel.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, is true.

(Which wouldn't have proved his point, but would have been wrong nonetheless...)