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Laura
tavella
01 July 2007 @ 04:40 pm
life at safeway  
People are weird, s'all I can say. As I was pulling out of the parking lot at Safeway, I noticed a guy slumped over the curb. Didn't see anyone around, so I pulled over into a spot, got out, shook his shoulder, put my hand on his ribs to see if he was breathing -- which I'm not terribly certain he was -- and popped open my cell phone to call 911. Even as I did so, I heard sirens in the distance. And indeed they eventually revealed themselves to be coming for the guy (after several wrong turns.) Which meant someone had taken the effort to call 911, which considering that I was still on hold by the time the ambulance located us in the parking lot, took considerably persistence... but wasn't willing to actually get out of their car and check the guy.

Not that I did anything exciting, apart from checking his breathing and making sure he hadn't thrown up, and flagging down a couple of drivebys to go tell the ambulance across the parking lot where to go, but... just, weird.
 
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sasori_san on July 2nd, 2007 12:02 am (UTC)
Thank you.

Most people wont do anything because of bystander apathy - ie, there are a lot of people around, so let them take care of it. Meaning the more people there are, the less likely the person is to get helped.

So thanks.
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Lauratavella on July 2nd, 2007 06:14 pm (UTC)
Well, I didn't do much, but thanks!
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Madeline the Edifyingzdashamber on July 2nd, 2007 06:54 am (UTC)
I was coming home from the airport one night, walking from the BART with pounds of shit slung over my shoulders, and by Lakeside Park I came across a homeless guy lying in the middle of the sidewalk. My dulled mind was considering what to do about this, since I didn't want to wake a crazy guy in the middle of the night while alone and burdened, but it was very cold and what if he was hurt... And then an ambulance pulled up at the curb and an EMT popped out and shook him, "Sir? Sir, you can't sleep on the sidewalk..." She looked up and nodded, as if I'd called. But I hadn't.

I guess I just summoned the ambulance with my MIND.
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Lauratavella on July 2nd, 2007 06:13 pm (UTC)
That was part of the reason I wasn't very aggressive about trying to wake/check his pulse whatever on this guy: he looked rough. Not street person rough, but my experience with drunk people is that waking up to being poked by a stranger often does not result in the best reaction.
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Thidawaterowl on July 2nd, 2007 10:59 pm (UTC)
I would do what you did but actually having been in several emergency situations I've learned there are some folks who can't handle emergency situations and in fact are an impediment because they panic. Some realise they are this way and would just call 911 without interacting with the guy at all. I think the fact the ambulance arrived meant that someone did care and did call and was probably panicking and giving poor directions.
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