I watched the recent 20/20 show where they put a crying child on the street alone and counted the very few people that even stopped to see if the child was okay. I could not believe the number of people that just walked by and did nothing, the numbers were staggering.

This was followed by 2 men sitting on a park bench being affectionate and the number of people that responded. The 2 men were in a long term relationship and only exchanged a kiss and a hug, yet so many people gave negative responses, going so far as to even call the police! I could not believe it, I was stunned.

People would not respond to a child obviously in distress, yet they could give their ignorant uninformed opinions to a gay couple? What the.................. This is a sad state of affairs in my opinion. Oh then they showed 2 women being affectionate and many of the men thought that was a 'turn on' and stopped to watch!

We live in a distorted world where a loving relationship is shunned and denigrated, yet a child is so blatantly ignored. I just don't understand it anymore. Any comments?

I'm not too surprised about the child - people are so paranoid (and with good reason) about being hit with lawsuits and possibly being accused of things that they are afraid to be good Samaritans.

As for the gay/lesbian couples, that is just shameful, but unfortunately there is a lot of that too - people who think everything is their business.

Parenting in public has become a nightmare. If you intervene in a situation where the parent is clearly oblivious or needing some help or skills, you get attacked by the parent. If you are a parent, and you discipline your child in the slightest, even verbally, you're told you're abusive. Everybody else is an expert, and I'm not surprised that strangers hesitate to get involved.

I'm in agreement with you - but I know where, at least on the non-involvement part, this comes from. The other half? No idea.

I always go to a crying child that appears to be alone. I've gotten dirty looks from it, but I'm not deterred. Let them shoot me the stinkeye - it's a crying child with seemingly noone near it, for Pete's sake.

I will double take something that is out of the norm - I'm human. The problem, I believe, is when you then extrapolate all manner of judgments on it. The trick is to notice it, process it, and decide that you don't need to have a judgment or opinion on everything that flies into your field of vision. Hard to do than it sound sometimes.

One time about 10 years ago DH and myself were walking out of a Savacenter or some similar store in a small strip mall. We were walking behind a woman with 3 children. The woman was 'out of control' for no reason. We had just seen her and her kids in the store. Nothing extraordinary, loud or weird. But for some reason the 'mother' in her mid twenties started a mean diatribe against her obviously oldest little girl who looked about 8 and a half. She called her a 'little B*tch.' She growled at the kid whom she had boxed by a cement post. The next oldest kid and even the 3 year old looked horribly embarrassed. The mother stood there berating the most shamed sad looking little girl I'd ever seen. One could just sense it wasn't the first time their mother had threatened them. She didn't hit them but htreatened her daughter with 'wait til I get you home you no-good little monster.'

I cringed. My husband and I looked at each other. I gently approached the mother and asked her 'PLEASE, don't speak to your daughter like that. You will hurt her and your children their whole lives with cruel words. Please get help. If you can't afford help, call the Parish and ask about free counseling services. Your children are precious.'

The woman looked shocked that I spoke to her, the kids more so. Obviously scenes like that had happened before and no nosy stranger had ever intervened. I've seen times where women got mad at their kids and it was 'normal'. This woman crossed the boundaries. her children looked like whipped curs. She had done it before. her kids had not acted up. The 'aura' around her was disturbed. You all would have had to be there to know what I meant. My main goal was to let the kids know 'mama' wasn't normal and normal people were noticing. With that knowledge maybe one of them would tell some teacher or counselor at school?

My sister JUST intervened in this way 2 days ago. I was SO proud of her for what she did, and she kind of pooh-poohed me, like "anyone would have done it." I told her no, not everyone would.

Basically, she was walking down the street in Somerville, MA, and walked by a little girl with a cast on her arm leaning against an SUV and kind of whimpering and looking down at the ground. She was clearly alone. So my sister stopped and asked her what was wrong. Clearly the girl had been coached about being wary of strangers, so it took my sister a few minutes to get that the girl couldn't find her mother. They;d been shopping in the drugstore right next to the car, but the girl said her mother was gone and must have gone to do other shopping and the girl didn't know what to do so she was waiting by the car.

My sister guessed she was 5 or 6, and assured her that there was no way her mom would have left her, and suggested they go into the pharmacy together to see if the mom was still there. The girl was resistant, because she kind of felt that staying at the car, her mom would have to eventually show up. Pretty smart way to approach the problem, actually. Anyway, my sister convinced her, they went into the store, and the girl waited by the front door to keep an eye on the car while my sister walked around, and, sure enough, located the mom in short order walking from aisle to aisle calling for her daughter. She'd never left. She and her other daughter had been waiting for a prescription to be filled.

It turned out the kid was only 4, just pretty big and pretty poised for 4. And the mom was appreciative. But all I could think of was that I would NEVER let my 4 year old out of my sight in a public place for long enough for all of this to have transpired. It seems like the mom must have been just letting the kid play around the store out of ear- and eye-shot, which doesn't seem all that bright to me.

When I told my sis she was a) a good person for doing this, and b) lucky the mom didn't ream her out for interfering, she was genuinely shocked by both concepts.

Ah, well. All's well that ends well.

Sharil, this is exactly how I feel about this sort of situation. Thanks for validating what I've felt for ages.

I just could not ever pass a child I thought was in distress regardless of the outcome. I could not live with myself. These kids on the show were actors hired by 20/20, and little, little crying kids, it broke my heart that people didn't at least stay until some one came for them, or call the police and even make an effort.

I would never, never, never pass a little fella who seemed to be in distress. They're who I'm here for ultimately, at least in my view.

Ah well, my son says I'm a misanthrope. Yep, this sort of thing would be why.

I saw an Asian child, maybe 18 mos. old, running down the sidewalk by a busy boulevard in Koreatown. Up and down the entire block there was no one else in sight. Like the song says, "Nobody walks in LA." I grabbed him. I kind of stood there, expecting to see his mother running out of one of the stores. Nothing. He struggled a bit and cried, so I took him inside a restaurant where there were several Asian women (I'm guessing Korean) and I explained what had happened. They agreed to take him and look for the mother. In case the mother didn't speak English, I figured those women would at least be able to talk to her or look for her at all the Korean businesses in that block.

However, I would be hesitant to intervene if a parent were involved with their child.

As for gays and lesbians being openly affectionate, this is LA!

I've come to the conclusion that the most morally indignant people are usually the most amoral. Ranting and raving about what they perceive as amoral makes them feel less guilty about their own moral shortcomings. "I may be A, B, C, or D, but I sure as hell ain't no fag!" They are just big bullies.

Many years ago I was driving home with my father when we noticed a toddler alone in the middle of the road. We stopped the car and I got out, took her hand and walked to the curb. I noticed that the occupants of one of the houses on the block were busy unloading their car after their vacation. The mother came out from around they car and almost took my head off about holding the girl's hand until I explained why. I think she may have been embarrassed because she grabbed the little girl and stalked off without a word. I can't imagine that anyone would have left her in the middle of the road though, she was only about two years old! I would have thought anyone would have stopped their car to help her.

-Noelle

Mod's note: Two of the same topic merged, topic moved, and double posts deleted.

I didn't see the show but I have no doubt that I would go to a crying child to see what was wrong. How could I not?

I may get flamed for this but so be it:

I think there is a gender difference in how adults who approach children are perceived. Women who approach little children are seen as motherly and trustworthy. As it should be.

Men however, are perceived through the lens of "pedophile?" I hate to say it, but that's the first thing that runs through my mind. Add to that this idea: If the parent has left the child alone (i.e. - not really caring for it), will the parent rush to my defense should other people accuse me of behaving improperly?

Yes, this is paranoid, but watch the news one evening and you'll hear story after story of monsters who abused young children. All it takes is one crusader-type who's watched too much Nancy Grace to fling an accusation.

For that reason, I'm incredibly leery of stopping for a child. Not to say I'll never do so, and my viewpoint may (probably will) change once we have some of our own, but right now, it would have to be serious for me to stop.

Now a stray dog or cat, I'll stop for one of those all day long.

I would not hesitate to approach the child, and I have done it. Also, in the library where I work, there are unsupervised children running around all the time. If the caregiver cannot be located right away, security calls the police, and we've had parents arrested for abandoning their children in a public place. The situations range from a moment's inattention to people leaving their kids in the library for hours (little kids too, some as young as 5) while they go shopping nearby or in one memorable case, while the mother went to Brooklyn to visit her boyfriend for three hours (the kids told the cops that she did that regularly).

People think their kids will be safe in the library and/or the staff will provide unlimited free babysitting - neither of those is the case. And you know there are pedophiles keeping an eye on the children's area for just such unsupervised children. It sickens me that people will leave their small children alone in a public place but would never leave a wallet in a public place for hours and expect it to be there, safe and sound, when they return. It is appalling.

As for the same-sex couple kissing - that wouldn't raise one hair of an eyebrow in NYC.

I would never leave my children in public for a second. 16 years ago when my youngest boy was 10 and he had to go to the bathroom at the mall. He was at an age that he didn't want to go in the women's room. So I knocked on the men's room door and then hollered into it if anyone was there. I then led my son in and after checking every stall I let him use the bathroom while I posted myself outside the door. A man approached wanting to go in, and I asked him to please wait a second until my son came out. He said, "Oh sure". ( There is no messing with mama bear ! )

A few days later the news came out about a young boy who was molested in a public restroom.

MASSIVE kudos to you, Morticia and tips of the hat to all those who have helped lone and distressed children.

No, I think you are right, Thomas. It's an unfortunate byproduct of the state of society today. I would give more pause if I were a man as well. I might still approach the child, but I'd wear it very heavily beforehand.

There are a lot of STUPID, head in the sand, Americans in this country, plain and simple.

So I'm the cynic here, but ... I'm wondering what 20/20 was trying to accomplish. When I see stuff like this, I feel like I'm being manipulated into feeling both outraged (How could they!) and smugly self righteous (Thank God I'm not like that.). A lot of shows/articles/blogs play on these emotions, IMO, because we enjoy them so much. There's also the preachy angle: Don't pass by a crying child, and don't judge homosexual PDAs. If you do, you're a Terrible Person whom we will all delight in loathing.

I dunno; it just makes me tired.

Yes, sometimes it does seem contrived. I get what you're saying. Not that I'm for child abuse or against gays!

Yeah, I think you make a really good point too, Twitch. It's aimed for something.

They show these What Would You Do shows every now and then. I guess one can draw their own conclusions from them, but they sure are interesting and quite revealing.