Like many of you, perhaps, I’ve long heard the chilling story of how some 38 Queens, NY residents ignored the cries for help of their neighbor Catherine “Kitty” Genovese as Winston Moseley brutally murdedered her on the street outside their apartments in 1964. I first read of the case in Harlan Ellison’s introduction to his short story inspired by the incident, The Whimper of Whipped Dogs (in, iirc, his collection Deathbird Stories). I long retold the story to impress upon people my views of how apathetic and uncaring we can be.
I’m 42 years of age, and I don’t get brought up short nearly as much as I used to. But, sometimes, I can be brought down a notch or twenty. I was told to get my facts straight, and damn were my facts crooked.
I was wrong. Harlan was wrong (not blaming him, he probably got his info from the sensationalized article written a couple weeks after Genovese’s murder).
So, have any of you long believed something that seemed impeccably true and honest, only to learn that it was all mostly hype and hyperbole?
“It was not reported in 1964 that Kitty Genovese was a lesbian and that she shared her home in Kew Gardens with her girlfriend, Mary Ann Zielonko. In this piece, the first broadcast interview she has ever granted, Mary Ann remembers Kitty and the time they shared.” http://www.soundportraits.org/on-air/remembering_kitty_genovese/
There have been murders of young lesbians on the street in Washington, DC just this year, most recently 24-year old Swoop Johnson last month. In at least some cases, the victims were targeted specifically for being lesbian. However, it looks like Kitty Genovese was a randomly chosen victim, from the account I read at Wikipedia.
^^^Yes, from what Moseley himself (amazingly thruthful in his detailed confessions) has said, he was “just looking for a woman to kill.”
And to add to my OP, it is still pathetic that one of her neighbors in the building where she lived and died actually heard the final stabbing and rape and did nothing–my point in bringing this up to dispel the “38 people saw everything, it lasted a half hour, she screamed the entire time, they closed their windows and went back to bed” nonsense. That never happened.
Pretty irelevent, but I once knew someone who told me they were related to Kitty Genovese. I forget just how they were related, though I can’t imagine why she’d lie about something so bizarre.
Really interesting thread, Sir Rhosis; I read the links early this morning, but wasn’t ready to post about it yet.
When I was in college ('70-'74), I took a psych course and participated in an experiment the prof was running - not as a subject, but as a “participant.” The experiment was supposed to be about ESP, but it was really a helping behavior experiment. In the waiting room there was a huge stack of chairs that looked unstable. There’d only be one subject - the rest of the participants knew about the experiment. They’d call us into the room in groups of three and we’d begin the test for ESP, trying to guess what the next card would be. Then there would be this big crash from the waiting room. The “plants” were supposed to act non-chalant or even ignore the crash; the real test was to see if the actual subject would respond and show concern for whoever was still in the waiting room who might have been injured by the stack of chair that fell.
I’ll be darned if I can remember the Professor’s name, but I think he researched helping behavior for many years and I clearly remember him telling about Kitty Genovese in lectures. This was at the Univ. of Delaware, just in case there’s anyone else out there who might remember.
It had an effect on me. Back in the '60s, when I was in 4th grade or so, the nun showed us a movie made in response to the Kitty Genovese story that indicted society. Then she told us of a man who was lying in the street downtown and everyone walking past thought, “Just a drunk” and did not offer help, and in fact he was having a heart attack and died right there in the street.
So last year I was driving home from work one night, and at the corner where I turned I saw a man lying motionless on the sidewalk. Instantly I flashed back to 4th-grade class with the nun telling that story. I got out and found him conscious but unable to speak or move, I asked if he was OK, he shook his head, and I called 911. While I waited there, another motorist stopped and asked if the guy was all right and waited with me. When the ambulance arrived and picked him up, they seemed unconcerned and even bored. They thought he was just a drunk…
Well, this is a first - a thread on the SDMB proves more accurate than aSnopes Urban Legends passing reference to the case.
And yes, I too have assumed all these years that the story was gospel. However, when I read the Wikepedia story and they mentioned her “roommate”…I immediately thought it was code for “lesbian” but didn’t find the link until later in this thread.
Thanks, Sir Rhosis, you have been a good soldier in the fight against ignorance and you should be getting your Order Of The Cecil medal in the mail any day now.
