When we think of the bystander effect, we tend to think of people ignoring crimes they witness, like pick-pockets and muggings, or ignoring someone in distress, who doesn’t fit certain criteria that makes them approachable. We think first of public or direct contact situations, but does the bystander effect apply to other, indirect aspects of American life? If we look at the social attitude in our country regarding rape, prejudice, or drug use/abuse compared to the majority of expressed individual opinions on said topics, most all of us have been or are bystanders to systematic injustices.

In America, one would be pressed to find someone who doesn’t oppose rape. However, rather than teaching children not to rape, we teach them how to avoid being raped. When someone does get raped, often there forms an attitude of ‘what did “they” do to bring this upon themselves?’ Rather than ‘what’s wrong with the rapist?’ Our society has been labeled a ‘rape culture’, as the rapes are expected, happen often, and we tend to blame the victim’s after.

The majority of American’s oppose racism and sexism, yet both are strongly prevalent in our country. Women often are paid less than men for the same job, if not for doing more work, and while many voices protest the injustice remains. After the Black Suffrage movements, many American’s who hadn’t previously held them, adopted the racial equality morals of those who facilitated the movement. Yet, the KKK still holds a strong existence in the American South. While the Black Panthers who formed to protect people from the KKK, were decried a terrorist organization and hunted by the FBI.

America, for better or worse, has waged a ‘war against drugs’, though we are riveted watching those in Hollywood crash and burn due to excessive drug use. People proclaim, it’s awful, someone should do something, but only after things reach a certain level. Rather than advocate intervention before rock bottom is reached, we revel so deeply in the spectacle of it, that the drug use actually promotes careers until the breaking point is reached. We could choose to boycott their work or the companies they work for, but instead, we watch with riveted disapproval as entertainers spiral out of control for our entertainment.

The medical personal who supply prescriptions beyond any legitimate medical need to celebrities, fear loss of business while the celebrity is alive, and the fear of loss of career and freedom only comes after an untimely death. We watched the spectacle of Anna Nicole’s reality show, where she spent most of her time on it so wasted she couldn’t talk straight, but withheld uproar until she overdosed and died. Even then, our anger was directed towards the lawyer, friend (we saw as a gold digger), and the doctor who prescribed her the ‘medications’. Not once did I hear anyone say, they should have canceled the show and admitted her into rehab before it reached this point. Then we watched as Michael Jackson followed suit, and again, we blamed the doctor alone. When Amy Winehouse drank herself to death, we cried it was tragic (though expected), yet no one stopped Whitney Houston from following suit. Watching an impending disaster play out, knowing the likely life altering results, and doing nothing is being a bystander. Feeling justified in doing nothing, feeling no responsibility to the situation, is bystander effect.

What of other issues in our culture? Healthcare inadequacy and poverty are two topics we declare moral opposition to, yet when it comes to the extra taxes to fund solving these devastating social problems or reorganizing the current taxes distribution methods, we voice an even louder objection. The same with education, we cry out for a solution to the plummeting standards and graduation rates, yet continue to cut funding. All these things are topics we as a society are bystanders in. We see the wrong, we know it’s wrong, we even say it’s wrong… but we let it slip by on a daily basis, or refuse to take the needed actions.

Amy Bach cites another area of social injustice in her book Ordinary Injustice: How America Holds Court . She writes about how many social injustices are embedded in the justice system, she points out countless cases that have gone unfilled, un-investigated, un-prosecuted, and practically ignored. These cases belong to the minorities and the poor. These cases are ones that if in a higher social status would have not been set aside, these cases have no excuse for not being processed. The justice system is overwhelmed and has been forced into assembly-line functioning, where adversarialism allows for officials to drop some cases, but many of these cases were blatantly mishandled if even looked at. Judges, when they do receive these cases, strong arm the people involved. They give them options like dropping the case or pleading guilty in the preliminary hearings, or waiting for the court date in jail. This is not how legal proceedings are supposed to function, but there is little concern from the judges that peers will report them, so it continues and justice is twisted.

So why do we just ‘stand by’ and let all these things slide? Why have we not just put our foot down and declared it indecent to let things carry on as they have and it’s going to change now? It would be easy to say it’s all tied up in the mess that is government, but our lobbyists, legislators, and congressmen and women don’t do anything we don’t let them do. They are our scapegoats in such areas, if we truly disapproved of the decisions they make, they wouldn’t be reelected. Or we could claim the problem is so large it is beyond each of us, but that takes us back to the purpose of the government officials we elect to represent us.

Daniel Dorling suggests in his book Injustice: Why Social Inequality Persists , that social injustice persists because of strongly held beliefs by those in power. “The five tenets of injustice are that: elitism is efficient, exclusion is necessary, prejudice is natural, greed is good and despair is inevitable.” (Dorling, Daniel. 2010.) Dorling puts forth that until these false beliefs are corrected in the minds of those in power, they will continue to be diffused into the rest of society. Until this correction is made, we can not stop the social injustices that occur in our society as a result, even though there is plenty of supply to meet the demand (with regard to applicable issues). Dorling’s theory puts forth that the five tenets mindset is the structure that supports people’s by-standing issues, that seem too complex or overwhelming to fix. The poor are expected to always exist, so only so much can be done to aid them, any more is a waste. There are only a small number of children capable of becoming educated and even fewer who can learn to run the country through it’s government. The mindset is laden with bias and prejudice, even though those holding it don’t see it as such. Correcting this requires making people aware of it’s existence and it’s alternatives. Once aware of the options, it is mostly a matter of choice and the rest would follow, or so Dorling asserts in his book.

Seeing so many social injustices day in and day out can make one numb to them, especially when they do not noticeably effect the given person. The thought of where to start or how can be so overwhelming one is more inclined to resume ‘not’ noticing. I suggest each person picks one social injustice at a time and do what they can to correct it, or bring attention to the issue. No one can tackle all the issues at once, it’s just not realistic. But, if each person picks one thing to help push in the right direction, improvements will be made. Eventually the number of injustices will decrease, and the rest will seem less overwhelming to deal with. In theory.

References

Bach, Amy. Ordinary Injustice: How America Holds Court. New York, NY: Metropolitan, 2011. Print.

Dorling, Daniel. Injustice: Why Social Inequality Persists. Bristol: Policy, 2010. Print.

Hockenbury, Don H., and Sandra E. Hockenbury. Discovering Psychology. New York: Worth, 2001. Print.

Jocelyn Johnson