This: http://videosift.com/video/Crowd-vs-Motorbike-bag-snatchers

... inspired me to sift something about the bystander effect.

I anticipate a lot of 'I wouldn't of just stood there, I would of beat his ass!' kinda comments. It's easy to imagine yourself acting heroically, but the actual moment would catch you off-guard and your initial knee-jerk reaction would typically be a fearful one. I guess most people don't really know what they'd do until the moment reveals themselves to themselves....but yeah.....I would of totally beat his ass!

^Yeah, everyone talks a tough game, but we all know what happens most of the time in these situations:

hehheh.

Father - "oh, you guys were good. I wasn't gettin' away."
Samaritans - *nervous chuckle* "heh, yeeeah. weren't goin' anywhere" -_-

also, good tip if you ever happen to piss off a group of people. say you're with a camera crew.

I wouldn't of just stood there, I would of beat his ass!

well a god number of people would not have enoughf informastoin for them to be able to make the desisoin that something bad was hapaning.

I mean in realty 99% of the time its actually going to be a kid been retarded.

so 99% of the time if you reacted you stand a chance of getting a beat down , or looking like a tosser.

I don't think the situation in this case is realy that much the bystander effect.

by stander effect can only realy be claimed if the person acting as the bystander has a good picture of whats going on and then decides sumone else will deal with it. for example when people have watched sumone get asulted or have hurd gun shots and done nothing about it . or when people are in a socail groop and they all fail to take actoin in a situatoin thats blatent.