How Large Cities Are Pushing The Good Samaritan Into Extinction

When chaos becomes the norm, it wears away your better nature

“The Good Samaritan Tends The Wounds Of The Wounded Traveler” — By Balthasar van Cortbemde (1647) Via Wikimedia Commons

As soon as I lowered the driver side window of my car, I already regretted it. My innate spider sense told me nothing good would come of it. And the woman waving proved me right.

“Look,” she paused, and tears welled up in her eyes, “I know I’m not pretty, but I just really need to get a date.”

I felt pity when I first saw her, which is why my finger clicked the button and lowered the glass. Suddenly it left me. I muttered something like “can’t do it,” and rolled up the window.

At this point you might be mentally calling me a heartless bastard, and you may be right. But you also don’t understand. You can’t. You don’t live what I do every day.

This random woman didn’t want to go out to a diner, stare into someone’s eyes, and feel her heart race. “Date” is a code word.

She was standing by a streetlight, slowly going to every car, and asking male drivers if they needed her services. It was only 6:50 in the morning. But time has no meaning for someone in that condition.

This is what drug addiction looks like.

And scenes like this have become so common to me, they’ve lost their impact. So, you might say addiction cuts two ways: it turns the addict into someone who loses all value in themselves and desensitizes those surrounded by addicts, wearing down their pity muscles.

Car Thieves Ditch A Car In Motion In Front Of My Store

It also wears down your tendency towards shock. Honestly, nothing shocks me anymore. In the past year, here are some of the things I’ve experienced:

• I’ve watched a kid get shot and killed by a rival drug dealer in front of my business.

• Saw a couple of teenagers (above) drive a stolen car up on our sidewalk, jump out while it was moving, smash it into a customer’s truck, and leave it running pressed into the vehicle. The police only came after the customer called a sergeant he knew on the force. The officer looked at the video from our camera and told me nothing would come out of it— he was originally chasing another stolen car anyway.

• There’s a daily epidemic of people drugged into zombie-like stupors, frozen as if they were statues.

• One of the random girls we’d see walking the streets every day was on the morning news; someone had set her on fire charring sixty percent of her body

But it’s not only me. I see this destruction of pity and altruism all around me by desensitization. Moreover, I believe the policies of large cities are aiding in it, making it much worse.

It can’t be made any planer than with the recent death of Jordan Neely on a subway train in New York City.

A Different Story Than The Media Narrative

Likely you’ve heard this story. If not, here’s a brief summary of what happened. A homeless Michael Jackson impersonator (Jordan Neely) screaming at passengers was choked to death by an ex-marine trying to restrain him on a subway train in New York.

The media and the usual suspects have focused on the color of the victim and the marine (black and white). In their opinion, that’s the ultimate story arc. But it’s a lazy one. It also misses the actual story, which is Jordan Neely and how he’s a reflection on failures at many levels.

Recently on journalist Bari Weis’ podcast, a group of mental health advocates and journalists discussed the case. They reveal Neely has had a history of mental health issues since he watched his mother murdered as a teenager. At thirty, Neely had been arrested forty times.

While most were petty, he’d been getting progressively more violent. The last three arrests involved trying to kidnap a child, punching a sixty-seven year-old man, then a woman of the same age in the face. After the final assault, he was sentenced to a live-in facility instead of prison. Neely left on his own before his sentence was up.

In addition, it’s also revealed Neely was on a top fifty list of homeless in his section of New York designated in need of treatment. However, he was continuously in and out of facilities. The major thing stopping Neely from getting treatment was Neely. He left on his own.

The panel in the podcast notes it’s difficult for “someone having a break with reality” to consent to something logically in their best interest. They also say an outreach worker saw Neely weeks before his death and commented without treatment he’d be a threat to himself or others.

This is the story of Jordan Neely, and it’s one that repeats and has deep repercussions for our society.

The Lesson For Today: Nothing Can Be Done

A recent community meeting in Oakland echoed the issues with Neely. A room filled mostly with women demanded action from local politicians because their area has become so dangerous. The continuous reply: nothing can be done.

For instance, an older woman who owns a martial arts studio claims a deranged homeless man lives by her business and threatens to sexually assault her every day. He also uses her sidewalk as a toilet. The police claim they can’t do anything because the man lives so many feet away from the business, and “community police” say they can’t help either.

Another woman asks for a show of hands by community members if anyone has been assaulted, and just about every hand raises. She repeats the mantra that police and government tell her nothing can be done about it.

But it goes beyond the authorities. You can’t do anything about it either because you may get punished for getting involved. Like a certain ex- marine on a subway. Getting involved has risks: to your own safety and legally afterwards if things go sideways. People notice this.

A local sexual assault on a train in Philly got national attention when a woman was groped for forty minutes in front of other commuters and her assailant only stopped when a subway employee arrived and intervened.

While passengers may not have realized completely what was happening, they didn’t bother to get involved. Although they filmed it on their cell phones.

There’s also the instance of a deranged man dragging a random woman by her hair through an NYC subway car. No one intervened.

Columnist Kat Rosenfield on Bari Weis’ podcast recounts a conversation with a friend who moved to New York about the subway. Namely, expect antisocial behavior and just ignore it. After all, nothing can be done — by the government or by you.

Now, I want you to take that thought process, engrain it into a society, and think about what it looks like. Well, you don’t have to imagine. I can show you.

A Glimpse Of The Future Reflected In Modern China And Russia

In 2011 in China, a toddler named Yueyue crawled into a street in Foshan. A van ran her over and sped away. Eighteen people passed the injured child lying in the road and did nothing, including another van which ran her over again. Eventually an old woman collecting cans retrieved her body.

Mark Mackinnon in the Globe and Mail reveals — despite appearances — the people in Foshan aren’t callous. They’re afraid. Getting involved can put yourself at risk. Many of the guilty passersby recounted cases where someone rendering aid was deemed liable for the injuries of the victim.

In other words, you can be punished for helping.

The same story is told by Bill Browder — an American investor living in Russia — during his interview on the Jordan Harbinger Podcast. He recounts seeing a man collapsed in the road. Browder instructed his driver to pull over so they could help the man.

The driver refused. Eventually after a long argument, the driver finally pulled over. Browder helped the man up, who thanked him. Then, the police arrived…and tried to arrest Browder and his driver.

They were finally released when the driver reached out to a ranking officer in the police force. Browder’s driver explained to him, you don’t help those in need because you can be held liable for their harm.

It’s why only the poor old woman helped the toddler in the street. She had nothing to lose. Unfortunately, most do have something to lose, and it can be used as leverage to put good Samaritans into extinction. Now, let’s examine this.

The Ultimate Way To Wear Away People’s Better Nature

If I were going to design a recipe to destroy the innate better nature of humanity, it would start with desensitizing them. Add a pinch of leaders saying nothing can be done while chaos spreads. Then, one more ultimate push: punish them for good deeds.

• That’s how a toddler gets tossed around on the road like a piece of trash.

• It’s why a driver in Russia is terrified to help someone laying in the street.

• Perhaps it’s why a train full of passengers will watch a sexual assault and a woman getting dragged by her hair and not intervene.

But I think this can be turned around. It starts with an end to that “nothing can be done” mantra that’s all too common from public officials — particularly ones in large cities.

If someone is truly a danger to themselves and the community, refusal of treatment shouldn’t be an option. It leaves dangerous people wandering the streets. Moreover, it puts random citizens into situations where they must decide how they’ll deal with a Jordan Neely. Either way it’s not right.

Finally, it leaves Jordan Neely or countless other victims of mental illness or severe drug addiction to be their own advocate when they’ve clearly broken with reality.

If we train people to accept antisocial behavior as the norm, good Samaritans will go extinct to the detriment of all.

-Originally posted on Medium 6/18/23