5 ms·

The infamous murder of Kitty Genovese in 1964 was reported the medias as 38 witnesses in an apartment block saw or heard the murder but none did anything to sav

by goto11 7y ago

The infamous murder of Kitty Genovese in 1964 was reported the medias as 38 witnesses in an apartment block saw or heard the murder but none did anything to save her, not even call the police. In 2007 someone digged into the story and discovered that this was wildly exaggerated. Only a few witnesses has seen the violence and they did in fact call the police - the police just didn't respond in a timely manner. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese Of course the original story resonated because it played into the eternal narrative that people "these days" don't care about each other, society is falling apart etc.

yrro 7y ago
A lie can truly travel around the world three times before the truth has got its boots on.
- brlewis 7y ago
  This is a bias we are all prone to. We all need to beware of letting a claim fly quickly into "unquestioned fact" status just because it fits into our narrative.
- menzoic 7y ago
  Eternity even
mehrdadn 7y ago
That sounds less like "wildly exaggerated" and more like just plain wrong in every way.
jnty 7y ago
It's not a coincidence that the 'original story' completely elides any negligence or wrongdoing by the police.
eli 7y ago
On The Media did a good episode on this https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/131359-the-witnesses-that-didnt https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/131359-the-witnesses-that-...
emsy 7y ago
Even if it were true, there's a more charitable and in my opinion more plausible explanation: people are afraid to bother the emergency line with redundant calls. These days it's probably more plausible than ever, because we hear of prank calls to the emergency line and don't want to occupy the emergency line more than necessary.
- jdavis703 7y ago
  You can actually be evicted for calling 911 too often – even if those calls are legitimate [0]. 0: https://thinkprogress.org/chronic-nuisance-laws-ordinances-evicting-people-with-disabilities-from-their-homes-7c64a7129dea/ https://thinkprogress.org/chronic-nuisance-laws-ordinances-e...
- Chris_Chambers 7y ago
  You appear to be assuming that everyone is as socially awkward as you are.
- goto11 7y ago
  You are playing into the false story by suggesting that it is true that a number of witnesses was aware of the violence but didn't call the police.
kartan 7y ago
> people "these days" don't care about each other, society is falling apart etc. Interesting point.It was 1964. The same people that complain about the current generation. I think that it's great that this myth of debunked. People wants to be good. Give people education and means and they will run a society smoothly.
- neom 7y ago
  Interesting thought, I like to think about how there is an inherent juxtaposition of selfishness and selflessness required in evolution itself, and the manifestation of that "perfect conflict" from a non-thinking (un-intelligent) evolving line to a (intelligent )thinking yet still driven by evolution, line. Not sure if that makes any sense. :)
- Wohlf 7y ago
  Every generation thinks they invented casual sex, every generation thinks the new generation is ruining the world. This has been true as long as history has been recorded.
  - bradknowles 7y ago
    /insert lyrics from "We Didn't Start the Fire"
- Chris_Chambers 7y ago
  Uh, no one in America in 1964 thought people didn’t care about each other. Everyone was in a traditional family in the high trust society in the 50s, and then in the 60s it immediately transitioned into everyone having sex with each other. No one in the 60s would have said Americans didn’t care about each other. No one. People say it now because it’s true. Where there used to be high trust and cohesion between similarly minded people of the same culture, there’s now just the static noise of multiculturalism and incompatible groups of people who hate each other. You’re actually a full blown retard if you don’t understand this by now, it’s been fleshed out in ridiculous detail within easily accessed sources for a long time. I don’t know why I’m bothering to respond to a smoothbrain, I can tell there’s no way you’ll ever grasp this.
atoav 7y ago
There is a very interesting small read from Georg Simmel written in 1903 called “The Metropolis and Mental Life” in which the Berlin based Simmel tries to describe how the new mega-cities influence the mind of it’s inhabitants. Even now, more than a century later his text still works. However only up to a degree — many people like to take some sort of preceived trend (”people are getting more emotionally cold”) and extrapolate it into the future. This extrapolation becomes part of their Weltbild and because we like it when our anecdotes line up with our Weltbild, we start to leave out facts that don’t. Does it mean that Simmel’s general idea that cities affect people is wrong? Probably not. It is just not as big of a thing as many make themselves belive it is.

by goto11 7y ago

yrro 7y ago

A lie can truly travel around the world three times before the truth has got its boots on.

brlewis 7y ago
This is a bias we are all prone to. We all need to beware of letting a claim fly quickly into "unquestioned fact" status just because it fits into our narrative.
menzoic 7y ago
Eternity even

mehrdadn 7y ago

That sounds less like "wildly exaggerated" and more like just plain wrong in every way.

jnty 7y ago

It's not a coincidence that the 'original story' completely elides any negligence or wrongdoing by the police.

eli 7y ago

On The Media did a good episode on this https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/131359-the-witnesses-that-didnt https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/131359-the-witnesses-that-...

emsy 7y ago

Even if it were true, there's a more charitable and in my opinion more plausible explanation: people are afraid to bother the emergency line with redundant calls. These days it's probably more plausible than ever, because we hear of prank calls to the emergency line and don't want to occupy the emergency line more than necessary.

jdavis703 7y ago
You can actually be evicted for calling 911 too often – even if those calls are legitimate [0]. 0: https://thinkprogress.org/chronic-nuisance-laws-ordinances-evicting-people-with-disabilities-from-their-homes-7c64a7129dea/ https://thinkprogress.org/chronic-nuisance-laws-ordinances-e...
Chris_Chambers 7y ago
You appear to be assuming that everyone is as socially awkward as you are.
goto11 7y ago
You are playing into the false story by suggesting that it is true that a number of witnesses was aware of the violence but didn't call the police.

kartan 7y ago

> people "these days" don't care about each other, society is falling apart etc. Interesting point.It was 1964. The same people that complain about the current generation. I think that it's great that this myth of debunked. People wants to be good. Give people education and means and they will run a society smoothly.

neom 7y ago
Interesting thought, I like to think about how there is an inherent juxtaposition of selfishness and selflessness required in evolution itself, and the manifestation of that "perfect conflict" from a non-thinking (un-intelligent) evolving line to a (intelligent )thinking yet still driven by evolution, line. Not sure if that makes any sense. :)
Wohlf 7y ago
Every generation thinks they invented casual sex, every generation thinks the new generation is ruining the world. This has been true as long as history has been recorded.
- bradknowles 7y ago
  /insert lyrics from "We Didn't Start the Fire"
Chris_Chambers 7y ago
Uh, no one in America in 1964 thought people didn’t care about each other. Everyone was in a traditional family in the high trust society in the 50s, and then in the 60s it immediately transitioned into everyone having sex with each other. No one in the 60s would have said Americans didn’t care about each other. No one. People say it now because it’s true. Where there used to be high trust and cohesion between similarly minded people of the same culture, there’s now just the static noise of multiculturalism and incompatible groups of people who hate each other. You’re actually a full blown retard if you don’t understand this by now, it’s been fleshed out in ridiculous detail within easily accessed sources for a long time. I don’t know why I’m bothering to respond to a smoothbrain, I can tell there’s no way you’ll ever grasp this.

atoav 7y ago

There is a very interesting small read from Georg Simmel written in 1903 called “The Metropolis and Mental Life” in which the Berlin based Simmel tries to describe how the new mega-cities influence the mind of it’s inhabitants. Even now, more than a century later his text still works. However only up to a degree — many people like to take some sort of preceived trend (”people are getting more emotionally cold”) and extrapolate it into the future. This extrapolation becomes part of their Weltbild and because we like it when our anecdotes line up with our Weltbild, we start to leave out facts that don’t. Does it mean that Simmel’s general idea that cities affect people is wrong? Probably not. It is just not as big of a thing as many make themselves belive it is.