Why people stop and stare at accidents! The truth!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

It’s instinct!

I know this after observing a horse’s behavior while riding along one day. We came across a dead cow. The horse stopped, tense. Looked. Sniffed. As if to find out…what killed this poor beast? A big wolf still lurking nearby? A disease? A big wolf three days ago that’s probably moved on? After the horse was satisfied nothing was hiding out to kill her, she moved on as if nothing were wrong.

It’s the same thing with crashes. People stop. Look. Okay, don’t sniff. Then drive on as if nothing is wrong! Because their brain has said, Ah! This has happened because of something that is not still a danger to me. So, no big.

Try it yourself next time you come across a wreck. Once you know why you’re looking, the urge to look over will be lessened.

That’s my theory. I’ve been meaning to share this for quite some time, so I’m glad I found this web site.

Miss Kitty

PRRRRRRRRRRR!

2

Really, I thought they were just trying to make it impossible for me to get home after work in under an hour.

Great minds discuss ideas;
Average minds discuss events;
Small minds discuss people.

3

Hm. I lack this instinct. My instinct is to scream and shake my fist at the rubberneckers. I mean, what do they want to see? Bodies? This is one instance in which I renounce human nature.

4

Yeahhh! I thought it was just done so I could yell “get a life!” at all the people who jam up the roads.

“Only when he no longer knows what he is doing, does the painter do good
things.” --Edgar Degas

5

I always thought it was just that people have morbid minds- want to see just how bad they CAN be messed up. You know, just like how moths fly into a candle.

Its sublime. Just like a trainwreck- you cant look away.

6

I’m a little sicko (short and stout) – but the nurse where I work knows me, and whenever we get a really good injury, she lets me know so I can look at it before she applies the bandages or the guy gets sent to the hospital.

It’s just morbid curiousity – but with an element of “there but for the grace of God”.

Today I saw a guy’s arm after it had almost been pulled through some moving rollers (shirt torn all to hell, swollen, bruised, the skin broken just a little bit). Heck, it was my daughter’s boyfriend. (He’s getting off on the pain pills tonight.)

Another really good one was when one of our maintenance guys sliced his little finger on a band saw, from the tip down, and came up with the finger slice wrapped in a napkin, little pieces of metal still stuck in it. This guy was a cool dude, didn’t even pass out.

Yet another was a woman who dropped a heavy piece of metal on her foot. She walked up to the nurse’s office, shoe full of blood, and was also cool as a cucumber. But her husband – when he came to see how she was doing – he turned white and had to sit down.

Another good one was a woman who somehow sliced her arm – elbow to wrist – I didn’t get to see it “live” – just the polaroids prior to surgery. All it needed was some mint jelly.

The very best was probably the guy working to fix a press – press operator didn’t know he was still in there and she palmed the buttons. That was before my time and I’ve only heard eyewitness descriptions.

All these people (except for the press guy) are doing fine, completely healed up.

But what’s weird about my sicko-ness is that while industrial accidents don’t creep me out, intentional violence does. Used to work for a criminal attorney and I was NEVER able to look at crime scene photos.

7

Auntie Pam, I started thinking you were one wierd chick, but then I remembered how many true crime stories I’ve read and how I LOVE the forensic science show on Discovery. I guess we are sisters in sickness :slight_smile:
Except you’ve got a tougher tummy–I get nauseated at the sight of blood!

8

I just had to look, having read the book…

Yer pal,
Satan

9

I saw the photograph

10

Satan – what book?

(Alzheimer’s check – either I missed something really obvious in the title of this thread, or ???)

11

Gee, I thought it was the same thing that attracted you to professional wrestling and cock-fighting. My theory was wrong?

12

Well, the Police seem to think it’s human nature. The cop that used to give traffic reports at work talked about how part of his job at securing an accident site was to keep the traffic moving in the opposite lane.
Rubberneckers could slow down and create a second accident over there.

13

Very interesting theory, Meow. It put me in mind of an atricle I had read about how elephants will pick up and carry the skulls of elephants that they find, even if they were not related. They are only interested in elephant skulls, however, and have no interest in, say, the skull of a rhino.

It also got me thinking about the Kitty Genovese incident. What makes us placidly watch as one of our fellow humans die before our very eyes when we have the ability to prevent their death? In one study I read, it was found that the higher percentage of DNA that a victim carries in common with a bysander, the more likely a “rescue” will be attempted. The same was found for chimpanzees. That doesn’t mean that alturism doesn’t exist humans and the animal kingdom, but it’s just not effecient, evolutionarily speaking, to risk our lives for someone who doesn’t carry our genes.