Bystander Effect and Mob Mentality: Black Friday 2008

If you keep up with me on Twitter, you know I did not partake in the Black Friday chaos because I finished all of my shopping online a month ago (yea for me!).  It sounds like that was a wise decision, as this year's Black Friday will go down in history as a dark day in humanity.  

My mom is just learning about the Myers-Briggs and Jungian theories and frequently asks me about random behaviors saying "What part of my personality is that?"  I have to remind her that the MBTI looks at normal preferences in your personality and does not explain all psychological phenomenon or any abnormal behavior.  But how does one explain this?

I began thinking back to my psychological training and remembered so many stories of how good people do bad things in certain situations.  So, what caused this?  Was it the economy and people being desperate to save a few dollars?  Was it poor security?  Was it anger over line-jumpers?  Cold and fatigue from those who lined up at 9pm the night before?  Was it because Wal-Mart isn't unionized, as Bruce Both the President of United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 1500 says (seriously, Bruce, this is not the time to capitalize on tragedy to make a union pitch- that's just sick!)?  

Or was the whole event something more primal and toxic about human nature?

Mob mentality is a very scary psychological incident which can turn ordinarily caring individuals into cold, violent perpetrators (soccer stadium stampedes, riots, etc).  In undergrad and grad psychology classes, I remember hearing numerous stories of other psychological phenomenon that could rattle the soul.  

• Philip Zimbardo's Stanford Prison experiment and how normal students turned a basement into a real Abu Ghraib
  
• Jane Elliott's Brown Eyes/Blue Eyes exercise- racism and discrimination in action
• Any Stanley Milgram experiment- involving shocking other people with supposedly lethal amounts of electricity
• Even more chilling is the real life story of Kitty Genovese who was raped, stabbed multiple times, was robbed and died after 3 separate attacks that spanned the course of 30 minutes while 38 neighbors watched and did nothing.

Put mob mentality and the bystander effect together and it's a perfect recipe for what happened on Black Friday 2008.

So, what do we do about this?  People across the country feel angry, but helpless in a situation like this (similar to the feeling many have over the Mumbai attacks this week).

I, like many people, was immediately outraged and wanted all of those involved brought to justice.  I had very angry thoughts about what should be done to those disgusting individuals who went on to buy LCD tv's and Wii games while a man lay dying in the doorway.  An eye for an eye, maybe?

Then, I remembered a Carl Jung quote that caught me off guard: "It is a fact that cannot be denied: the wickedness of others becomes our own wickedness because it kindles something evil in our own hearts."

We are no better than the people who trampled Jdimytai Damour if we harbor evil thoughts about those involved in the tragedy.  It is not for me to judge or decide the fates of those responsible.  My personal belief and value system help me remember that all actions are rewarded or punished and all I have control over are my own behaviors.

So, all we can do is be kind to others...and always shop online on Black Friday!

Carl Jung:  Understanding does not cure evil, but it is a definite help, inasmuch as one can cope with a comprehensible darkness. 

Carl Jung:  The healthy man does not torture others - generally it is the tortured who turn into torturers.