Panama City Beach Spring Break, or, What is Wrong With People?

I'm guessing people have seen this story on the news. During spring break down in Florida, a nineteen year old woman was raped on a crowded beach, and not one person did anything to help. Although they had no problems getting their phones out to videotape it. The woman was apparently drugged and didn't even know it had happened to her until she saw video of the rape on the news and recognized her tattoos.

Unbelievable. For just so many reasons. Never mind the fact that apparently four men thought rape was a good idea (and I hope all of them are caught and spend the rest of their lives behind bars), but was there not even one decent person on that beach paying any attention? I mean, I know there's that whole bystander effect thing, where people in a group are less likely to help because they think someone else will, but really? Here, let me hold up my fucking phone that I can't put down for even a minute and catch this heinous crime on video, but I won't worry about using it to actually call the fucking police or anything.

I honestly don't know what parents are teaching their kids these days. But I'm afraid for society.

 

From what I understood, the woman was unconscious, which automatically would make it nonconsensual, even if she had spent all of her waking, sober time having sex with these wastes of space. But yes, I suppose some of these people nearby could have been so incredibly drunk they had no idea what was going on- which just leads back to my "what is wrong with people?" comment.

Not to mention that according to one comment made by the local sheriff, this isn't even the first time something like this has happened and been caught on video.

 

That's what I find most disturbing, to be honest.

I think if I noticed something going down the way I understand this situation went down (and I wasn't so drunk I was incapable of thought like apparently most of these spring breakers were), that I would call the police or get security or something. Because it's obvious to me that if a person is unconscious, he or she is not capable of giving consent. I think I'd rather err on the side of caution and piss off a couple of people if I were wrong than have it on my conscience that I did nothing and let someone get hurt. I don't think I would physically get involved, though, because I'm not very big or strong, and in this case there were three or four men involved.

If it were a different situation and it really did seem consensual, I don't know what I'd do. I might just find it so annoying that the people couldn't be bothered to get a room that I'd rat 'em out anyhow. Or I might just ignore it. I don't know. Which I suppose is your point.

I just find the whole situation incomprehensible. For one, I can find nothing fun about the idea of drinking and partying that hard with a whole bunch of strangers, so I can't even picture myself in the sort of situation where I might witness something like this. And I find it sad that people are so ill-behaved and uncaring about their own safety that the local authorities can't seem to impose order and protect everyone.