What Is Up With The World?

[Mr. Zhu]

Or rather, America?
Mob mentality at its finest, and its worst.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,458744,00.html

[Belle Hibiki]

Because this kind of shit totally doesn't happen in other countries. Nope.

[Ander]

Mob mentality happens everywhere. Countries like Russia or the Ukraine come to mind, where I'm told you have to be pushy like that for the sake of survival. If you don't get there first, you don't get it at all. But that's for necessities like food. The ridiculousness of this lies in the fact that a good portion of the shoppers on Black Friday are there for non-essentials. Just a bunch of people trying to save a buck.

[Dr. Cringle]

Oh wow. That's..wow. I mean my mom's participated in Black Friday before (she and my father once stayed in line at Best Buy all night to get a good deal, and the day after they ended up on the front page of the Sunday newspaper), but to my knowledge none of the Black Friday shopping sprees my mom's been on have ever turned violent. Mean-spirited, yeah, but never...wow.

[Alexander Trafford]

the total death count related to black friday is three i think. three people died because people needed to save a buck, and i really needed CNN to tell me we were in a official recession today. assholes.

[Jonathan Meer]

Ask the question about humanity, and do not confine it to solely our time.

[Sage]

The difference about this, as already stated, was this was for nothing. Not to get food, or water, or anything essential. This person died just because somebody wanted to buy some frivolous item for a few dollars less.

[Belle Hibiki]

I could turn that right around and point back to the Canada Bus Slayer guy. He stabbed a dude like 15+ times, IIRC, and then decapitated him for no reason whatsoever. Does this mean that I can then call all of Canada fucked up because of it?

Of course not. People die for no real reason all the time all over the world. An accidental trampling to death of three people at isolated incidents is not indicative of anything. It's just people trying to hate on America because that's the 'in' thing to do these days.

[Sage]

That incident was inexcusably horrible. It's a shame he's being prosecuted in Canada because ultimately it'll be a slap on the wrist for what he did. There are horrible people in Canada, I'll not contest that.

People get killed in my city because of arguments over who has the better looking jacket. I can't defend that. Why bother justifying something so stupid. There has to be something inherently wrong in Western culture for these things to happen. I'm not saying we're doing any worse than some other society but we are doing worse than we should be. If that makes any sense at all.

[Super Buu]

To me, this story represents humanity at its absolute worst. I'm sure none of the killers will blame themselves.

[Orion]

To me, this story represents humanity at its absolute worst. I'm sure none of the killers will blame themselves.

Exactly. People in Western culture are so up themselves they could never think about being wrong.

[Jack]

There's a difference between being a psycho and accidently killing someone because you want to watch New Year's Rockin' Eve in HD.

I will never understand how people don't know they're stepping on another human being.

[Kaden]

Exactly. People in Western culture are so up themselves they could never think about being wrong.

Huh?

Supes didn't say anything specifically about "Western culture."

[Lucifer]

But... Obama won... How can this be?

[Jonathan Meer]

It's really easy to talk about things like this at arm's length, but let's not forget that, if all humanity is a bunch of bastards, then we're in that pot.

It wasn't any one person that wanted to kill a man and did so. It was a bunch of people who, collectively, were irrational, and each of us could have just as easily been a part of that. I doubt anyone present actually wanted to kill someone.

[Sage]

The point is a man was trampled to death over a fucking sale. Nobody stopped to help him because they were all too busy trying to save a buck on something they didn't actually need. You're really trying to defend the people who killed him?

[Belle Hibiki]

Do you really not understand what's being said?

[Alexander Trafford]

Do you? Just because no one meant to kill the person, and the people trampling those poor people could have been any one of us, still doesn't excuse their actions. I'm pretty sure Krillin is saying everyone is capable of dangerous irrationality and because the tramplers could have been any of us, do to us all people capable of irrationality, then we're all stupid douschebags.

It's really easy to talk about things like this at arm's length, but let's not forget that, if all humanity is a bunch of bastards, then we're in that pot.

But, you have to imagine that these people wouldnt realize that there is a man below their feet. The difference between a body and tiled floor is pretty blatant, even if you're rushing. So you'd have to suspect people purposefully disregarded the fact that they were trampling a man and continued to push forward in order to save a buck. They made a calculated, rational decision not to help this man. Hell, they probably did one of those "I'm not going to do it, but someone else will." justifications in their head. So, i think, at some level this was a rational decision not to help these three people - which i think is what Bra is getting at. Do you not really understand what's being said?

[Belle Hibiki]

I'm perfectly aware of what's being said, which is why I'm confused as to why Bra is acting like this is somehow exceptionally base. People are killed for LESS reason all over the fucking world all the damned time, like I said before.

Did I say those people who trampled the employees are innocent? No. While they likely didn't know they were killing the people by rushing - the same way you might not expect to kill someone by punching them - they were still careless enough to run over someone in the first place, and that's on them. I'm not sure if that's manslaughter or third-degree murder, but it's still wrong, and I won't defend them by saying they're somehow innocent.

What gets under my skin is people pointing at this and saying that America is somehow messed up, as if Americans are the only people who risk endangering others to scrape together a few dollars.

[Jonathan Meer]

None of you seem to understand that this was a trampling. In big riot scenarios like this, the crowd is pushing from all directions, which naturally occurs from a huge mass of people attempting to get through a very small area.

No one killed anyone to save money. A man got trapped underneath a crowd, NOT individual people. There's a very big difference.

But, you have to imagine that these people wouldnt realize that there is a man below their feet. The difference between a body and tiled floor is pretty blatant, even if you're rushing. So you'd have to suspect people purposefully disregarded the fact that they were trampling a man and continued to push forward in order to save a buck.

Let's not forget that a man was killed by a crowd. For that much force to keep him down and kill him, the crowd itself must have been rushing. If a man was killed, then the rush must have been such that anyone who lost their feet would also have been likely to die. In such scenarios, it is absolutely IMPOSSIBLE to stop a crowd in its tracks and attempt to help someone in the middle of it. The people in the back are pushing forward as the people in the middle push forward as the people in the front push forward. At this point, the crowd has become a single entity, and no individual is at all capable of stopping and helping, for, if they did so, the sheer power of the crowd behind them would topple them, and leave them in equal danger.