I would not advise interacting w/ someone in a similar situation. Many of these people aren’t dealing w/ reality and may come up fighting. It’s either call the cops or ignore it. If you ever experience getting involed in an altercation over something like this, you may understand why people are reluctant to voluntarily get involved. As I said before, it’s a tough call.
Oh please. You thought someone was in deep trouble or dead, but you didn’t want to foster dependence so you refused to help?
Patient: I’m bleeding!
Doctor: Well, I’d give you stitches, but that’d just take away your independent chance of dying.
FWIW, you can always call the non-emergency number of your local police department and discuss the situation with the dispatcher. He/she can then decide whether it warrants a visit by the police or paramedics thus relieving you of the ethical burden.
If that’s too much for you to take on, you really ought to consider upgrading your moral compass because the one you’ve got is faulty. Hint: If you have to ask, then you probably should call the police.
OK jsgoddess, we get it, you don’t have to keep proving you’re on the bandwagon after being accused of potentially defending me. 
Thread title: Should I do anything about a potentially dead guy in front of my apartment?
I’m left wondering – how about if he were dead? Would you feel compelled to report that there were a corpse in your front yard – obviously, not until decomposition had progressed to the point where there were no longer any doubt about his level of deceasedness – so someone remove the corpse?
I think my brain’s exploded.
There is a huge difference between not disturbing a person who may be homeless and who has found a place to rest/sleep and choosing not to provide the most basic act of human compassion by phoning 911 for medical assistance for someone you think, as jsgoddess said, is either in deep trouble or dead.
I’ve tried calling a non-emergency number here and I was firmly told to call 911, I tried to explain that it wasn’t an emergency, but they didn’t want to hear it, call 911 or don’t bother us, that’s the message I heard. Then you hear, on the TV news, about all the unnecessary 911 calls?
“We protect and serve”, just don’t annoy us.
Lying passed out for two hours in freezing water is business as usual? Thinking that the person may be dead is business as usual? Then why bother posting about it? Oh wait, I think I know.
Lying passed out for two hours in freezing water is business as usual? Thinking that the person may be dead is business as usual? Then why bother posting about it? Oh wait, I think I know.
It’s fascinating that he would view this as someting that happened to him.
What if it turns out that this was not a homeless drunk, but one of your neighbors who had a heart attack? Would you still not seek immediate help for them just because you want to foster independence?
Someone sleeping in a sprinkler is not there by choice. They are not a bum sleeping in a doorway, or on a park bench. And if they are drunk, or stoned, who cares if the police hassle them? They shouldn’t be in your front yard, and they should expect to get in trouble for their actions. But if they are truly ill, they need help. If you can’t help them, call someone who will. Don’t wait hours. Be human.
Personal insults don’t belong outside the Pit, friedo. Please don’t do this again.
I have seen my share of sleeping homeless people. I have been friends with people who either were or later became homeless. I promise you that the homeless would prefer not to have the police called on their behalf unless it was truly an emergency. Many of them spend a good deal of time drunk and off their rocker, interacting with authority is usually a fairly unpleasant activity for them. That said, an ex of mine ended up homeless for a period of time and nearly died from pneumonia as a result of exposure to the elements. He’s since gone on to build a modest career, pay his taxes and spend time with his lovely fiance, all because someone helped him out when he was shivering on the streets and almost dead.
I see people sleeping at bus stops on a semi-regular basis and I try to let them be. If something seems a bit off (being doused by sprinklers, laying literally in a gutter or driveway, etc), I call 911. When it comes right down to it, I’d rather you were hassled by police than left for dead.
I think this is the best bit of advice in either of the two threads on this subject. It is not only based in the reality that yes, Virginia, sometimes there are bums passed out in public, but also gives a pretty good guideline for when it is time to call in the authorities. You taking note, Rigamarole? (I want to give you credit for sticking around to take your lumps in these threads, too. It’s not easy being the object of a pile-on.)
This OP disturbs me to my core. I’m all for personal rights and responsibilities, but there has to be some time when we look out for each other, or why bother calling this a society?
-Lil
I too want to give credit to Rigamarole for hanging out in the thread, responding as reasonably as possible and not getting overly defensive. I’m not sure I would have responded as admirably.
Rigamarole, I also want to commend you for taking the time to ask the moral question when you were in doubt. I hope that this experience does not deter you from doing that in the future. I know that if I were in your shoes, I might not so easily ask for advice in the future. I hope you continue to do so.
I also think that it was a valid question to ask of yourself about moving the person since if you did so and injured that person, you might have been liable for their injuries. I’m not 100% sure about this one, but I think it’s true.
I find it a bit ironic that Rigamarole has received such poor treatment for asking the moral question where he did no harm and was only asking if he should take a positive measure for helping someone. On the other hand, others have posted some very hurtful and insulting things which can be very damaging and none have asked the moral question of whether it would do more harm than good to do so.
Well, I truly didn’t know the response was going to be so heated. I’m really so used to the bums passed out thing that this incident really only seemed mildly out of the ordinary, and I did actually want opinions. Like I’ve said before, I live in a scary neighborhood and I don’t like messing with people who I don’t need to be messing with.
But I thank everyone for their point of view, and I want to at least say that in retrospect, I think a simple 911 call would have been for the best, even though he may very well not have appreciated it. This particular bum seems to have went on his merry way, but I certainly will remember this one for next time. 
Well said. Thanks.
Indeed. You’ve acted like a mensch in this thread, Rigamarole – let’s hope this helps you act like a mensch IRL when the occasion arises.
Are the police that unreasonable over there? Obviously I live in a different society to the OP, but I’ve always found the police around here to be compassionate and helpful. Called to a scene as described in the OP, I can picture them determining if the man was in need of medical attention or if he was ok, and perhaps locking him up for a few hours to sleep it off if he was drunk, but I’d be shocked if they charged him with loitering. This could just be my inner-Pollyanna coming out, but my experiences with the police here have always been positive.
I’m reminded of a quiz I once took online that assessed your approach to personal safety. One of the questions was something like “If you were home alone and a stranger came to your door one night and told you their car had broken down, and asked to use your phone to call a friend for assistance, would you a) let them in or b) tell them to go away?” and obviously choosing the former meant that you were compassionate but lacked good personal safety sense while the latter meant you put your own safety ahead of helping others. Discussing it with my friends, I complained that I would do neither - I wanted an option c: get the number and make the phone call on behalf of person at the door. I see no need to sacrifice my personal safety for a stranger if I can help them while still protecting myself. In my opinion, calling 911 for the unconscious man was the option c for Rigmarole: it didn’t put him in a position where he might be in danger from the man should he turn out to be drugged up, unbalanced or violent, but it was better than walking away from helping someone who clearly looked like they were in danger. How could he know the man was in danger? Well, as a general rule of thumb I think being unable to tell if you’re looking at a living person or a corpse is a pretty good indicator that something is wrong.
Being charged with loitering would suck, but I personally would choose it over a cold and lonely death in the street.
Yes, you’ve identified the fallacy in moral choices presented as either/or: IRL, we’re often able to develop a better choice than those given as our only options.
When I taught in an Orthodox Jewish high school, one of the kids asked me if I’d rather be a happy pig or an unhappy philosopher. I said that I’d rather be a happy philosopher. He indignantly told me that that wasn’t one of my choices, and I told him that I rejected the terms of his question. He couldn’t let it go, and kept following me around telling me I had to choose one of his options, and could never seem to wrap his head around the idea that I didn’t think his question was a reflection of reality.