Article snippet: The rape itself was horrific enough. In March, half a dozen boys and young men lured a 15-year-old girl to a house in Chicago and sexually assaulted her there, brutally and repeatedly. But what made this episode singularly appalling was the attackers’ streaming their crime on Facebook Live. From a count posted with the video, investigators deduced that about 40 people watched in real time. Yet not one of the viewers bothered to summon the authorities. Eddie T. Johnson, Chicago’s police superintendent, did not hide his disgust. “Where are we going, what are we doing, as a society,” he asked later, “that people will actually look at those crimes taking place and not pick up the phone and dial 911?” At least two teenagers have been arrested in the attack, but no charges have been brought against any of the online witnesses. It is not clear if they have been identified or if their inaction, however morally obtuse, qualifies as a criminal act where they live. Few states have laws requiring citizens to intervene when they know a crime is taking place, and those statutes usually apply to a narrow set of circumstances. What happened in Chicago may trigger a sense of déjà vu in older Americans who readily recognize the name Kitty Genovese. It is more than half a century — long before the advent of Facebook and other forms of social media — since Ms. Genovese was murdered in Kew Gardens, Queens. But as recalled in this final offering in the current series of Retro Report, ... Link to the full article to read more
What the Kitty Genovese Killing Can Teach Today’s Digital Bystanders - The New York Times
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