Courage. Do you have it?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Scenerio (1)
You go to the grocery store for some milk. You pull up, there’s a light mist in the air. You hear see a mother 3 kids coming out of the store. The automatic door swings open. The two kids run across the street towards you shouting merrily. Mom and the other child - an infant - walk slowly across the street. Then a car wizzes around the corner straight at one of the kids bent down picking up her jacket in the middle of the street. Judging by the acceleration of the car and the the driver clearly doesn’t see the child. There’s maybe 8 seconds for you to run, grab her, and get out of the way. You may hurt her in the process but she will not die. What do you do?

Me…just because of my sheer size, running towards the little girl would hopefully signal the car, yet breaking stride would limit my ability to grab her with a sure grip and get her away from the vehicle. Also there is a 40% chance I’d be hit, and little girl saved. I’d risk it and do it.

Scenerio (2)
It’s 11 p.m., you do not want to go all the way to the grocer, so you stop at a local convenience store. You are in your sweat pants, no socks, and loafers. It’s cold outside. You pull into their little parking lot and notice a light go off in the car next to the one you pull next to. Not caring much you get out, shut your door, and start walking into the store. You remember in your minds eye that the car had a window in the back open half way. You are almost across the parking lot when you hear a muted scream, and a mans voice saying " SHUT THE F**K UP, YOU SAY ANYTHING I’LL KILL YA…" Not wanting to turn around you enter the convenience store, shaking not knowing what to do.
What do you do?

Me…I’d call the cops right away, but not go out to the parking lot. This one is a little more difficult. Should I have turned around in the parking lot and approached the car? The guy’s voice sounded like he was pretty big and angry. I may go back, pretend not to see them and sit in my car while the cops arrive. Not sure! it would be an exercise in morality and courage. Courage may prevail.

Courage is an interesting human emotion, gained and lost over the course of a life time. Some women when they have their first child gain quite a bit of courage. Some men take jobs because they feel they have an over abundance of it i.e. Fireman, police officer…But what about courage could be inherently in grained in all humans? Do all humans have it? Why can it be latent and then suddenly spring into action almost instantaneously?

Mods didn’t know if this was GQ or IMHO?

2

I hope that in scenerio 1 I would be quick enough to save the child. I am afraid that eight seconds might only be enough time for me to think “that child is going to be hit by a car, what should I do?”

In scenerio 2 I would also call the cops right away. I wouldn’t go back to the car myself being just a small women. I doubt I would be able to help and might make the situation worse. Now, if there were several other people in the store then I would tell everyone what I heard and try to get a group to go back out to the car.

3

  1. Running towards the kid while yelling, “Run! Get out of the way!”

  2. Stand at the door of the store and yell, “Hey, you in that car, what are you doing?” That way, I alert the people in the store and make the guy in the car know that he has been discovered.

4

Here’s one:

You’re going to your car after a night at the bars and you spot a man slapping his girl around in the parking lot. Do you approach? Or do you ignore?

5

I am a coward. I was in a bus once that was hijacked. It was late at night and I was sitting 2 seats behind the driver. A man stumbled on, wrapped his arms around the driver’s head, and yelled, “Take me to General Hospital or I’ll blow your fucking head off!” My immediate response was to want to flee to the back of the bus but I was too scared to do anything except crouch down behind the seatback in front of me.

In contrast, Two men came rushing up from the back and demanded to know what the problem was and could they help? The situation was diffused by them without anyone being hurt. I’ve always felt that I acted cowardly but I think it was because of the gun. I think I would have the courage to put myself in danger for a child. I know I would for a family member or loved one. When real danger happens people just react, there’s no time for analyzing.

6

Scenario 1 - I know I’d want to help, I just don’t know if I’d think fast enough to realize what to do. If I realized I could do it, I know I’d try.

I’ve actually had something very close to Scenario 2 happen to me. A liquor store was getting robbed, and everyone was running out. I looked in and saw the cashier getting robbed. Myself and another guy ran in there and beat the crap out of the robber and held him until the cops came. He had a knife, no gun. If I was alone? I don’t know. I probably would do the same as I was quite a bit bigger than the guy and I’d take my chances. At least I could probably buy time for the cashier-girl to flee.

7

When I was 16 me and several friends saw one guys getting rough with a girl on a schoolground and another guy watching. They were all probably about 18. Three of us headed over to help the girl when she reached up, hugged and kissed the guy. Seeing that, and the smiles on their faces since we were a lot closer by this time we realized she was in no danger and we turned around.

8

Scenerio 1: I would run at the girl as well. Screaming and waving my arms. Getting the attention of the driver hopfully to slam on his breaks. Then after all is well I’d scream at the mother for not seeing it or not keeping her kids next to her carriage.

Scenerio 2. I’d call the cops then go out there. I’m not a small man. As long as the guy didn’t have a gun I’d try to do something, anything. Even if it was to just get the make/model and license…

9

Scenario 1: I would make an attempt at the running dive for safety. Of this, I have no doubt.

Scenario 2: Draw attention to the scene and call the cops. I would likely not rush in if I saw a gun simply because I also know that courage can mean knowing when a situation can best be handled by a non-physical act. My response would, of course, be a whole lot different if a loved one was involved.

10

I think you’re being hard on yourself, GKW. If I was in that situation, I’d want to make damn sure I didn’t do anything that would get the bus driver’s head blown off. Not to say I would do absolutely nothing (although I might end up making that decision), but any action I did take would require a lot of thought beforehand. Now, if it was evident that the hijacker was having the bus drive at 100 mph onto a playground full of kids, I’d take more drastic action.

Maybe the guys from the back of the bus had experience with this sort of thing. Maybe they were hostage negotiators. Then again, maybe they were just damn lucky that the bus driver didn’t end up with his brains smeared against the side window.

11

Exactly. If the scenario takes place in a place other than the US, where you don’t expect a gun, it can be handled a lot neater. One thing a person can do is to sneak up on the car and try to restrain the attacker quickly until the police come. I wouldn’t try that in the US though, because of the easy access to sidearms.

12

I’m just plain stupid when it comes to this kind of stuff.

for #1, I’d run into the street and most likely get killed or paralyzed in the process.

for #2, I’d go right up to the car yelling and get shot to death.

I know that this is what would happen because of three scenarios that have actually happened in my life.

1978 - I was just starting my senior year in high school. I was out on a Friday night with a group of friends when we came upon a guy beating the living crap out of a lady. Three of us rushed the guy (being 17, we were invincible, of course) and seperated the two of them. We got the guy on the ground, but that’s when the lady (his wife, we found out later) got pissed at US and jumped into the fray, pulling us off long enough for this guy to get his balance back and proceed to beat the living crap out of the three of us while his wife helped. By now, our other two friends were into the pile, trying to pull people apart. When the cops came, four of us spent some time at the police station under questioning while the fifth person was taken to the hospital with a broken nose and collarbone.

1986 - Being freshly trained in CPR and First Aid, I had an opportunity to bring some of my skills to bear while on a sailing trip. A friend got clocked in the head with the boom during a jibe. He tore his scalp open pretty bad and had a fairly serious concussion. I, along with the boat’s owner, did our best to affix banadages, tape, etc. to the wounds while the rest of the crew turned for shore and radioed the Coast Guard. In the middle of all of this, the fellow who got clobbered came in to fuller consciousness, but not full lucidity. I was holding him at the time so we wouldn’t lose the dressings that we had put on him. He got violent, not knowing where he was. Long story short, he managed to thrash so badly that he tossed me right over the side of the boat. The bandages came off, blood went everywhere and now the crew had a man-overboard thing to do. He lost consciousness again shortly thereafter. I ended up with a case of hypothermia.

1990 - Coming out of a gay bar with several friends, we witnessed a car on fire in the parking lot. While one of the guys went back inside to call 911, four of use dove straight in to try to put the car out (yes, I know.) That’s when we discovered that a gang of creeps had either set the car alight or used the oppotunity to do an old fashioned bashing. Only a couple of us got seriously hurt, because someone had seen the car fire long before we had come outside - police and fire arrived not 90 seconds after we got jumped and the attackers ran off. My total for the night? - a sprained ankle and second degree burns on my face and arms.

So, you see, I sometimes have what some might consider fool’s courage. Real courage is knowing when you CAN’T help direclty and finding another way.

13

I think it’s unrealistic to consider these situations. We all WANT to react in a certain way, but we can’t know until something extreme happens.

Also, how to define courage? The definition I’ve always agreed with is the ability to do what is necessary, regardless.

That doesn’t mean placing yourself at risk needlessly. If your plane or bus is hijacked, the best thing might be to just sit quietly under some circumstances.

Newsweek did an interesting article two weeks ago on soldiers’ reactions to fear when they enter combat for the first time. They claimed that the most common yell heard is not “Charge!”, but “Mother!”, despite their prior eagerness to get into the thick of it.

This is NOT to say that that is a cowardly reaction, or that soldiers don’t have courage. I’m just illustrating my point that I doubt a person can know how they will react in a dire scenario until it happens.