Recently I was on the subway going home when this group of what I presume to be high school students walked on to the train. There were three girls and two guys. It was a relatively crowded train so they weren't all standing together. But one of the guys was within arm reach of one of the girls. When she wasn't looking, he would extend out and pat her on the back. She turned around, smiled and told him to stop. Every now and then she would hit him. When she would scold him, he started calling her names such as "Ugly" "Big nose" "Jew" and "Arab." What her background was, I am not sure but she had very light skin, which doesn't reveal anything really. But, clearly she couldn't have been Jewish and Arab, but I'm going to guess Jewish.
When we reached the next stop, some people got off and the guy moved in and was right next to the girl he was harrassing. He said, 'Now, that I'm right next to you, I can really harass you." To which she smiled.
As the train continued, he kept up the name calling, and messed up her hair by pulling it over her face and holding it there so she couldn't see. When he let up, she'd be smiling while hitting him in the chest and telling him to stop.
Throghout this time, I was against the doors on the opposite side of where they'd be opening. This was happening in front of me yet I did nothing because the girl was smiling and it just seemed like they were joking around. I could tell by the expressions on everyone else in the car's faces that they were just as annoyed as I was, but nobody said anything. We got to the next stop and a lot of people got out freeing the area next to me by the door. The guy wraped his arms around all three girls and shoves them into the door next to me. They hit the door pretty hard but had no reaction. He continued to mildly harrass her and then they stopped.
Throughtout this time, I urged myself to say something, but I didn't. My logic was, "She's smiling, so she's not too concerned about it and not in any harm. For all I know it's her boyfriend or brother or something." When he shoved them into the door, I asked myself, "What exactly needs to happen for me to step in?" Where is my threshold? Would it be different if she wasn't smiling? If she needed help, why didn't she ask for it, there were people on the train? Then again, battered women rarely run and ask for help, they actually vehemently defend their assailants. Maybe I just don't want a confrontation. I didn't know these girls. They mean nothing to me, I'm not going to get in a fight for them. If charges were brought, the girls wouldn't back me up. so why bother? Then I thought of a quote, "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing."
I regret not getting involved. I've seen confrontations like this on the train before and usually the aggressor immediately backs off when a stranger scolds them. Something, I've never really understood either but that is normally how these things end. I'd like to think that if it escalated, I would have done something, but the more I think about it, the more I think of the Kitty Genovese story. Kitty Genovese was violently raped and murdered on a lit street. At least 27 people saw her get raped and subsequently murdered, yet nobody called the cops. When asked why, they replied, "I thought someone else would have."
I was just like those 27 people. I waited around for someone else to get involved. I would like to implore those of you out there to learn from my mistake. I hope if this ever happens again, I'll be confronational because I really don't like feeling this guilty. If I said something, and I had the 5 of them yelling at me about how it was just a joke, at least I would have known I tried!
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