WTF Stories of the Week

[Alex]

Terrible story. But I watched 5 minutes of CNN but had to turn it off not because of the images but because of the voices of apparently honest shock that people who weren't under the collapsed structure actually tried to help the people who were. Even *gasp* though they didn't know them.

I really can't stand how we're apparently supposed to react with surprise that in events like that people help each other.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by Alex

Terrible story. But I watched 5 minutes of CNN but had to turn it off not because of the images but because of the voices of apparently honest shock that people who weren't under the collapsed structure actually tried to help the people who were. Even *gasp* though they didn't know them.

I really can't stand how we're apparently supposed to react with surprise that in events like that people help each other.

I was reminded of this post, which was in regards to the stage collapse in Indiana a little while back, while watching coverage of this weekend's air show crash.

They had a quote from a family member of one of the victims who died. He was there with his son and his son's friends, all of whom survived. The family members said, "I think that he probably sheltered his son. And that's the kind of guy he was." Really, THAT kind of guy? Wow, what a remarkably unique trait that guy must have had, to instinctively protect his children! Let us all laud him as the singularly amazing human being he was for doing something that no one else in the world would ever do, protect their child from danger!

I, like Alex, am rather sick of the fiction that the instinct to help others is somehow NOT the norm and miraculous when it happens.