Proof of the Empathy Gap Between the Housed and the Homeless

When a well-dressed woman collapses on a busy sidewalk, people rush to help her within six seconds. When it's an unshaven older man in raggedy clothes, it takes an average of three minutes for someone to stop and offer assistance. When the man falls down holding a beer can the wait is much longer, as more than 100 people walk by without even making sure he's alive. It's a homeless woman with a cane who eventually comes to his aid, throwing away the can, asking passersby to call an ambulance and calling the man "Billy" until she can find out his real name.

The proof is below, from a hidden camera show called What Would You Do? The video is from last year, but when Homeless Girl posted it on her blog recently, I found it to be even more pertinent than it was when it aired, since we now have the tragic story of Hugo Alfredo Tale-Yax to learn from. Tale-Yax is the homeless immigrant in Queens who was stabbed while defending a woman from a mugging in April in Queens, NY. The attacker stabbed him, Tale-Yax stumbled and fell, bleeding, onto the sidewalk. New Yorkers walked by the dying man for more than an hour before anyone called 911. When firefighters arrived, he was dead.

In a one-woman example of the moral of the video, our blogger Becky Blanton has written about how differently she was treated when people thought she was living out of her van by choice while on an adventure than when they realized that she was homeless. As Becky has written, "It's all about the money, honey. I inadvertently learned that even the perception of money can change the perception of people. When I pulled up in my ratty van to a couple of the popular restaurants I liked that had full glass windows in the front and went inside, people looked at me as though I was crawling with lice or a communicable disease. ... One day I got out with my camera bag and MacBook because I had photos to download and needed the electrical hookup in the restaurant. I didn't get the same reaction. Why? I was holding $3,000 worth of electronics."

Simple but sad, huh? Becky goes on: "I played with it a few times. I struck up conversations in line, asked about places in the area to take pictures, all legitimate questions. I got a great response — if I had the camera. If I pulled up in the van and just stood in line to buy lunch and asked if there was a good wildlife viewing area nearby, people shrugged or politely ignored me. If I had the camera bag and pulled out the Canon and fiddled with it while asking the same question I got enthusiastic responses."

Photo credit: Bob With