After several horrific fatal stabbings in London, people are asking themselves what they would do if they saw something dreadful happening as they walked down the street.What would I do? If I saw a man attacking a woman or threatening someone with a knife, if I saw a woman wrecking her ex's car or hitting her child, would I intervene or would I hurry past telling myself it was dangerous to interfere?
I've often seen mildly disturbing scenes like a man and woman screaming at each other or a woman swearing at her little boy, but I've never seen anything so violent or sickening that I've thought seriously of trying to stop it and protect the victim.
It's hard to predict what I would do if I suddenly found myself in that situation. I like to think I would do the altruistic thing and intervene but I might simply be too scared to act. Especially if the attacker looked really vicious or was brandishing a weapon.
I do remember though an occasion many years ago when Jenny and I were in a London supermarket and saw the manager knock to the ground a frail elderly man who was walking out with a stolen packet of cheese.
We were so disgusted we complained heatedly to the cashier and abandoned the basket of groceries we had been about to buy. Afterwards we both felt very public-spirited and glad we had made our anger known.
But when I hear about people who've tried to stop some act of violence, and ended up seriously injured or even dead, it does make me think twice about being a Good Samaritan. When it came to it, would I just cut and run?
