Bystander Effect And Gang Rape

I read an article posted on the CNN website titled, ‘Gang rape raises questions about bystanders ' role’ and it deals with the issues and meaning of the bystander effect. The article discusses a situation where a girl was at a school dance and she was being gang raped, and instead of people helping her, people instead took pictures and videos and some even joined in. To give some background, the bystander effect is a social psychological phenomenon that refers to cases in which individuals do not offer any means of help to a victim when other people are present. The first account of this was in the 60’s when people heard and watched a serial killer stab a woman to death. “Kitty Genovese struggled with the attacker on the street and in her building. She …show more content…
The article also touches on why people wouldn’t report such crimes and it is due to the fact that they believe the crime has nothing to do with them so they shouldn’t have to report it or the responsibility of the crime being reported will be diffused. Going back to the Genovese case, the article also discusses that this became symbolic and was named as the “Genovese syndrome”. Also it is touching on the youth not being necessarily aware of what is going on and whether or not it is victimization. Basically, for teens, if they don’t necessarily feel or have an emotional bond or touch by the situation they will most likely not help the person/people in need. With teens the whole who would have more power thing is the most important thing. Most of the time bystanders will look to the victim as less important because they are the one having the crime committed to them so clearly the person committing it is the one with power. Also having to do with the youth or more so children, The Sherrice Iverson Child Victim Protection Act passed in 1999 makes it a misdemeanor to fail to report a crime against a