> When a stranger murdered Kitty Genovese outside of her Brooklyn apartment while thirty seven bystanders watched without so much as calling the police, This i

> When a stranger murdered Kitty Genovese outside of her Brooklyn apartment while thirty seven bystanders watched without so much as calling the police, This is a popular myth spread by the media because it fitted the Lord Of The Flies-type view of humanity that was popular at the time. It's completely false, however. Most of those 37 bystanders weren't watching at all and had no idea what was going on. The few that did notice what was going on tried to chase away the attacker, call the police, or help Kitty. That doesn't necessarily mean the bystander effect itself is incorrect; I remember a much more recent event where dozens of people watched while someone drowned. But the murder of Kitty Genovese is not a good example of it, and the effect is clearly a lot more complicated than it's often presented, because there are also many examples where a large crowd does help, sometimes at significant risk to themselves.