Report: Shoppers unfazed as man dies at Target

[IDemo]

Source: msnbc.com

Family and friends were stunned by the loss of a West Virginia man who died while shopping on Black Friday as fellow bargain hunters reportedly walked around — and even over — the man’s body.

Family members told WSAZ-TV that 61-year-old Walter Vance of Logan County, W. Va., had become ill and collapsed while shopping for Christmas decorations inside Target in South Charleston. He later died after being taken to the hospital, family said.

Witnesses told the NBC News affiliate in Charleston, W. Wa., that shoppers walked around and even over Vance’s body.

"Where is the good Samaritan side of people?” Vance’s co-worker and friend Sue Compton told WSAZ. “How could you not notice someone was in trouble? I just don't understand if people didn't help what their reason was, other than greed because of a sale."

Read more: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/26/9035999-report-shoppers-unfazed-as-man-dies-at-target

[begin_within]

1. The Reason for the Season!

[woodpecker44]

79. Dead Man

When the cops came I bet they handcuffed him before allowing him to be taken out of the store.

[Jackpine Radical]

2. Why aren't the clerks trained to drag these bodies aside?

You don't want to impede the flow of the live ones.

[IamK]

15. you would think they have something similar to a "spill station"

for dead people....

[_eh]

19. The clerks are obviously Communists

trying to slow down capitalist transactions! :rofl:

[left on green only]

24. Especially live ones with money

. :toast: :fistbump:

[Jackpine Radical]

36. Yeah. I meant "live ones"

in about the same sense as a used car dealer uses the term.

[Enthusiast]

26. Good point.

Those clerks should get a bad evaluation.

[jmowreader]

42. Clerks are trained to not touch dead bodies

Because...well, you know, the body may not have been quite dead yet, and if a clerk moves a body the family is going to blame the death on that clerk.

You're supposed to call your manager, have the manager call 9/11 and keep the body from being trod on...which, as we can see, didn't happen in this case.

Then again...as thinly as stores staff these days, there being a clerk in the same area as the corpse was far from certain.

[Tunkamerica]

52. I've worked in several retail establishments

never once was i trained to do anything with a dead body.

[Kablooie]

74. I thought yearly dead body handling classes were mandatory at retail outlets.

[caseymoz]

75. Wouldn't that be dead-body not-handling classes? Like abstinence-only education?

I know, terrible. :crazy:

[Pacifist Patriot]

84. Shoot, maybe that was the one day I had off.

[Pacifist Patriot]

83. Granted, it's been awhile, but....

I worked for six different retail chains and never once had any sort of training with respect to such an event. When I was a manager with one chain I had to beg for basic first aid training for my staff.

We weren't trained to avoid a dead body, we weren't train to do anything one way or the other.

[spooked911]

48. Indeed! Get with it, people!

[UnrepentantLiberal]

66. Clean up in isle 5.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

78. "Corpse cleanup, aisle three."

[lonestarnot]

92. OMG, I laughed. I am ashamed.

:(

[Fantastic Anarchist]

95. Don't be ashamed. ;)

It's the PTB that should be ashamed, not you.

We just need to mock them endlessly, like Pepperspray Pike dude. Fight them with video, mocking, and laughter.

:rofl:

[Lorien]

97. Mocking the death of a man makes anyone who does so

just as bad as those who stepped over him. I lost my father who was right around his age just a few months ago. It wasn't funny.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

98. I was being sarcastic with the initial statement.

I lost my father, too. I never meant to minimize this man's death. I meant to illustrate the callousness with which the people in the store behaved.

I'm sorry for your loss. :hug:

Edit: to clarify that I'm mocking the store, the people who ignored him, and the system that let this happen.

[grantcart]

100. You were close but it would have been

"Now offerring holiday discounts for coffins, aisle 3"

[Mac1949]

3. "Black Friday" used to be an amusing aphorism, but the last few

years it's really been living up to it's name. Sometimes I despair for people. :-(

[Zorra]

4. "I just don't understand if people didn't help what their reason was,

other than greed..."

Yep, that's it. Heartlessness, selfishness, and greed go hand in hand. It's what conservatives, the GOP, the Tea Party, are all about.

Rachel Maddow: Republican Debate Audience: "Let Them Die"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zy9TvrSGVHE

[unapatriciated]

47. Two people did try to help.

This is from the op's link
"An E.R. nurse who also happened to be shopping at the store tried to administer CPR. She and an off-duty paramedic tried to help Vance while he was on the floor."

I have never understood black friday nor have I participated in the craziness of that day. I celebrate by spending zero dollars on that day.

[idiotgardener]

57. I can understand not helping...

If you're not medically trained and 911 has been called, there's not much you can do and you will just be in the way.

I cannot understand stepping over the poor man, though. Total lack of respect.

[snagglepuss]

103. You can down beside the person to be with them or stand beside the person

to ensure the person doesn't get trampled.

[lbrtbell]

5. But hey, let's send riot police after the Occupiers!

I mean, people walk over dead bodies at OWS every day. :sarcasm:

:cry:

[madmom]

6. another reason to hate walmart.....oh wait!

[Jackpine Radical]

60. Target, WalMart--all good fascist firms.

It's mahybe just that WalMart has been a little more successful--and brazen--in their exploitation of the lower-class workers & consumers of the world.

[lbrtbell]

70. This could happen anywhere

It's not a matter of who owns the store, it's about people not giving a damn about their fellow man.

This mindset started with Ronald Reagan making it cool to be a selfish, heartless, greedy bastard in the 1980's.

[Jackpine Radical]

93. You're right, of course.

Damn, it's difficult to recall that there was a time in this country when great humanitarians were revered.

"Albert Schweitzer? What a chump. He could have made millions with his medical degree on Park Avenue."

[SoapBox]

7. Disgraceful. And it shows how America has gone to HELL.

Amazing...simply amazing...

Selfish...self centered...COLD...mean...angry...

...what the hell America?

[OnlinePoker]

8. And I'm sure a bunch of them pulled out their phones to film the guy instead of helping.

What are the good samaritan laws in West Virginia? Can people be sued for helping people there? I know this is a fear a lot of people have when coming to the aid of others so they don't get involved.

[zeemike]

28. That is bullshit...they did not help because they were to busy

Shopping for bargins....way to busy even to take a picture of someone dieing on the flore in front of them...
No one is going to be prosecuted for calling for help for a dieing man...

[chrisa]

44. If they are anything like the average American, probably.

(Guy having heart attack)

Bystanders: OMG LOL Whip out ur phone I'm gonna post this on YouTube! (But nobody calls 911)

(Bystanders continue to laugh at, film, and taunt dying man until he dies. Video is posted on YouTube, and the few decent people left wonder wtf happened :shrug:)

[riderinthestorm]

9. Wow. Just wow. No words really, just stunned at the callousness and greed. nt

[Citizen Worker]

10. Indifference to human need, a uniquely American trait.

[totodeinhere]

18. Not uniquely American. Didn't you hear about this incident in China?

http://articles.cnn.com/2011-10-20/asia/world_asia_china-toddler-dead_1_sina-weibo-state-run-xinhua-news-agency-guangdong-province?_s=PM:ASIA

[Codeine]

21. Hardly.

There is nothing about Americans that is uniquely good, nor any trait about us uniquely bad. Callousness did not originate here.

[Tunkamerica]

53. that was an idiotic statement.

[tblue37]

11. When the Walmart employee was trampled to death in last

year's Black Friday stampede, people stepped over his body in their rush to get to the sales.

(At least I think it was last year--maybe it was the year before. These disasters all run together in my memory!)

[Warpy]

12. I hate the Xmas shopping crowds

to the point I'm a hermit between Thanksgiving and the first week in January, venturing out only once in a while for food. They're so focused on getting consumer junk that they lose their humanity.

[Odin2005]

40. Me, too. I exlicity avoid all stores between Thanksgiving and the following Monday.

[rocktivity]

13. You can't tell the shopping disasters without a scorecard

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=210&topic_id=46397&mesg_id=46436

:headbang:
rocktivity

[alp227]

14. Really telling the mentality of Black Friday obsessed shoppers,

emphasizing the ME over the we. Oh, I wonder about their voter registrations. If there is surveillance footage of everyone walking past the dead man, I want their photos and names NOW!

[Odin2005]

41. Sadly, I know plenty of Progressives who participate in this crap.

:(

[alp227]

63. and maybe they would be bystanders and passers by to victims of crime???

[plumbob]

16. No one checked the body to see if he had gotten anything good?

THOSE shoppers are really short-sighted. Dumb bastards.


So glad we dropped the whole commercial holiday thing 25 years ago.

[Hulk]

17. Bor will have a field day with this one...

I love how we keep Christ in Christmas. Such a damned joke. I think many of us go to church on Christmas just to rid our conscience of guilt for our waste and greed. Christmas has become just that in this country.

I've been going to Mexico for Christmas for the past five years...and I absolutely LOVE the difference. There you maybe get a gift for your mother-in-law...as in a simple item...and the tree is absent of all the boxes of Chinese made crap and nonburnable wrapping paper and ribbon. We actually live in central Mexico, and all the hype about cartels and kidnappings is about as rare as being shot at in a local shopping mall is here in the US.

Christmas is my least favorite time of the year, and has been for the last fifty years of my life. Just a commercialized crazy-house. Talk about superficial?

[Joe Bacon]

23. More proof that America's real God is Ayn Rand!

And Jesus is John Galt, who sees nothing wrong with anything goes!

[skepticscott]

27. But here's betting

that a lot of those people were gawd-fearin' Christians who will go to church Sunday and thank Jebus for all of the bargains they got.

[Joe Bacon]

96. Yes and they will get their weekly brainwashing.

Yes, the pulpit pimp will bless them in the name of the Father (Ayn Rand), the Son (John Galt) and the Holy Spirit (Invisible Hand)...

[tawadi]

20. I would like to say I'm shocked. eom

[WranglerRog]

22. "Where is the good Samaritan side of people?”

Lest you forget, the "good Samaritan" was a quasi-pagan.......Considered an inferior race by the "blessed".......

[caseymoz]

32. Good Samaritans these days pepper-sprays you.

I mean, look at the police looking out for the safety of those OWS protesters.

[southernyankeebelle]

25. I would have stopped. I have when I have seen someone in trouble.

This is suppose to be the season. So far its the season of selffishness. Shame, shame, shame. That is all I can say.

[Plaid Adder]

29. The headline is misleading, and what's 'below the fold' suggests a more complicated picture.

I think anyone who knows me will vouch for the fact that I am willing to believe any evil of corporate capitalism. However, I would point out that the piece appears to be sensationalizing this event as much as it possibly can, and distorting it in the process. Because:

1) Vince, the person who died, did not die "at Target." He collapsed at Target and died at the hospital. The distinction matters, since ignoring someone who is sick is different from ignoring an actual corpse (though it's debatable which is worse).

2) As for "Where was the good Samaritan side of people?", the article does mention that a nurse and a paramedic who were there shopping saw Vince in trouble and tried to administer CPR. I would submit that this is the good Samaritan side of people in action. First of all, it'd be quite the coincidence if Vince just happened to be near two people professionally trained to respond to medical emergencies when he collapsed. It seems more likely to me that someone who *was* near him saw him collapse and alerted enough people to the situation that the nurse and paramedic found out about it and came over to help. Second, once the nurse and paramedic were helping him, then it wouldn't have been useful for the other shoppers to hang around watching; that would just mean the ambulance EMTs had to fight through a crowd to get to him. The way the piece is written, you don't know how much of this walking around Vince's body happened before the two good Samaritans got there and how much of it happened after; so you don't know how many of these holiday shoppers were in fact callously ignoring a human being in trouble and how many of them were going about their business after verifying that people more qualified than themselves were taking care of him. Either way, obviously there were *some* people in that store who noticed Vince and did their best to help him.

All this says nothing about the irresponsibility of deliberately promoting mass frenzy for the purpose of selling more crap to people who generally don't need it and often can't afford it--which is something I will deplore as vehemently as anyone else you can find. But I don't think it does us any good to be told that human nature is *worse* than it actually is--which is what this piece seems to me to be doing.

The Plaid Adder

[Enrique]

30. good point

one thing that doesn't make sense to me is this part:

Witnesses told the NBC News affiliate in Charleston, W. Wa., that shoppers walked around and even over Vance’s body.

Ok, so did these "witnesses" help Vance? Or did they stand there and "witness" the people walking around the body? It's not clear to me.

I would like to know how the story came to the attention of this TV station. Did something really out of the ordinary happen with this man, and someone called the station to report it, or are TV stations everywhere scouring hospitals and police reports for Black Friday stories?

For example the co-worker that is quoted as deploring the lack of Good Samaratinism, did she actually witness the event, or did the TV reporter stick a microphone in her face, give her a hyped-up version of what happened, and ask her to comment on it?

[muriel_volestrangler]

81. The co-worker didn't witness the event

because the report said he went to the store on his own (assuming that she didn't just happen to be in the same part of Target that night at the exact same moment as the man she worked for).

It's not that surprising the story made it to TV - a co-owner of a store (actually, I think more than one, from what the TV report says) suddenly dying might get noticed as a very local level which might have worked up to local TV level anyway, but, yes, TV covers 'Black Friday' (look at the intense interest in stories about it on DU), so they would have been on the lookout for injuries or worse at stores.

[Pacifist Patriot]

87. Shall I tell you my retail experience with local TV media?

It may give you an idea of what I suspect happened.

Let's go back a few years to when The Satanic Verses was all the rage and flying off the shelves. I worked at a Waldenbooks in metro-Atlanta. A local tv station interviewed a few stores about being out of stock and all of us made the point the fatwa had made the book so popular we couldn't get delivery fast enough to keep up with demand. I unwisely made a crack about people being unable to find it on shelves because we were having to sell it out of the stock room because people were buying it as fast as we could open the boxes.

The asshole goes on air and shows a snippet of the interview with me, cuts away and then informs the public there are copies available but the stores have decided to pull it from the shelves and keep it in the stock rooms for fear of violence related to the fatwa against Rushdie. The next day a dumb ass redneck comes in my store and spits in my face (literally hawked one at me) and calls me an un-American coward for giving in to the "rag heads" and censoring Rushdie's book by pulling it off the sales floor. I have my doubts he would have understood the allegory if this idiot had slogged his way through the novel. (Judgmental much? You bet!)

I had another negative local television media experience when working holiday retail at an Eddie Bauer store in the Boston area, but I won't bore you with those details.

Suffice it to say, I don't for one minute put stock in anything a local television station says about what is going on inside a retail outlet. The truth is probably far less sensational than the story.

[Pacifist Patriot]

88. Self-delete

(wrong place)

[CottonBear]

59. Thank you for your reasoned response.

I am very happy that you are still here on DU.

Peace to you and your family.

CB

[quakerboy]

72. I noticed this as well

If there was an observer to people stepping over and ignoring this man on the ground, then isn't this observer all the more the schmuck for specifically watching and doing nothing? Or, more likely, is this some story a reporter ginned up to play on the black friday narrative?

Reading the actual article to try to find an answer to this question, I noticed the bit about the nurse and paramedic. I also noted that nothing is said of how long he waited for assistance. per the actual facts presented, it could have been a long time, or it could have been 20 seconds from him hitting the ground to when someone was there assessing the situation and trying to help.

[Tunkamerica]

76. yeah, but it's easier to think better of yourself if you believe most people are bad

[Pacifist Patriot]

85. Thank you!

[qanda]

86. I think it's sensationalized also

I was at a mall recently and a man had collapsed. There were many people who walked by him but it was because there were already a couple of people helping him and many of the people walking by, myself included, asked if the paramedics had already been called as we continued on our way. Honestly, there was nothing we could do except get in the way of real help. I don't know what the man's outcome was but I'm hopeful that he was okay.

[kgnu_fan]

94. Thank you for your cool head...

I hope people stop shopping on black friday. Commercialism and greed hurt our society in many levels.

[grantcart]

101. Factual and reasoned

How did you get in here anyway?

[ananda]

31. So many of us have turned into shopping zombies.

So sad.

[lib2DaBone]

33. These are the shoppers who watch Fox News and listen to Limbaugh...

..If that isn't enough to prove that Armewgeddon is real....

[left on green only]

34. If Target is the refined man's Wall-mart,

and I do believe it is, then I can easily imagine how the juxtaposition of this dark event upon the realm of the other could have easily given new meaning to the term "enlightened" spirit.

[left on green only]

35. Did I say that?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

37. Kitty Genovese?

[tblue]

55. Except in her case, they at least paid attention.

But I think it is that groupthink/peer thing where people figure, "Hey everybody else is ignoring it, so why should I stop? Besides, there's this great waffle iron on sale."

I wonder if there is a chance the man could have been saved. :cry:

[eridani]

71. The more people there are, the more people are likely to think that someone has already taken care

--of it. There are actually studies on this. A single person seeing someone on a sidewalk almost always stops to help. Start adding more people, and the more likely it is they will all stand around thinking that one of those other people is surely more qualified to deal with it than they are.

Lesson--never assume that just because a lot of people are witnessing an accident that someone has called it in. Do it anyway.

[AngryOldDem]

38. Hey, can't let a dead man get in the way of those bargains!

To paraphrase the song, "It's the most dis-gust-ing time of the year..."

[Odin2005]

39. It's "Uniquely American"!

All hail your god MAMMON, America! :puke:

[tblue]

56. American Exceptionalism

We suck worse than anybody. Sometimes.

[SoulSearcher]

43. the pits

Can't really understand this.

Reasons?
- If I touch him, someone will sue me
- If I do anything, someone will sue me
- Gotta get that coffee maker, but I hope he's ok
- If I had stumbled on his body and hurt myself, could I sue the guy on the floor?
.....( And THEN could I buy the coffee-maker???)
- He's probably a politically-connected 'Occupier' anyway...

[spooked911]

51. No, I think it is more-- if I waste time on this guy, I will miss out on saving $2 on

some "valuable" merchandise.

[KoKo]

45. Tragic...the Mainstream Media goes on for Weeks about "Buy, Buy, Buy" and Stampedes

occur because the GREED causes Stampede of folks looking for bargains in a horrible economy.

Maybe these people are "uncaring, greedy, fools" who will kill anyone who gets in their way of what they want or ......OR...that Marketing Theory has now taken over and some are like SHEEP and the "Model" is that you give the sheep a reason to go into the "enclosure" whether with a dog yapping at their heels or promise of "good food" once the sheep get there.

I think this analogy is weak though. It's more like sending a pack of angry, hungry dogs after a prey where they are given the sent and then they go for the KILL ...and anything in their way is sacrificed.

Either way...this is a cruel representation of what America Is these days in the Eyes of the Corrupted Fascist Media.

:-(

[PatrynXX]

46. This reminds me of a movie

Shawn of the Dead or is that Shaun of the Dead. can never remember


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfDUv3ZjH2k like everyone going round ignoring the dead people lying around. zzzz 2000 was in psychology class and they taught this but it was the car method. ie oh someone needs help on the side of the road.. eh next person will help which is what the next person says. But walking over someone who's dying. Well now I know why I avoid black friday. Basically like legal gambling.. (oh wait, gambling is legal now. course when I grew up in WI only the Native Americans had this. :(

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

49. SHUT IT DOWN!

Oh, wait.....it's not an "Occupy". Never mind.

[sarcasmo]

50. Zombie consumerism.

[MrMickeysMom]

54. How many years of de-sensitization have paid off?

I mean, until the next reality show IS Black Friday?

I love marketing the way Bill Hicks did. shows and forensic 24/7 of non-stop violence, or post mortem analysis, bad writing and weird camera angeles of people who act poorly... It just dumbs us down more and more each passing day.

Stay tuned for bargain basement rug beating...

[Brooklyns_Finest]

58. We are like the Chinese now

http://www.chinasmack.com/2011/videos/2-year-old-chinese-girl-ran-over-by-van-ignored-by-18-bystanders.html

[postatomic]

61. Yea, us 'mericans are much better

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Fn5ce-0GBQ

:eyes:

[MindMover]

62. Employees should have at least called 911....

no its sale because of greed.....

[muriel_volestrangler]

82. They did call 911

It's in the TV report. It also says that it's company policy for employees not to attempt first aid themselves; which is what might be the controversial bit here.

A couple of people there told the TV reporter, about the employees:

"They said they couldn't physically help because of company policy. They did call 911. "

[tavalon]

64. Sometimes, the thought that I share DNA with the rest of the human race,

Just makes me sad, very, very sad.

[CoffeeCat]

68. I know!

I said the exact same thing today...that I am, at times, ashamed to be a human being.

We seem to be getting worse!

I just wish the mothership would return, declare this experiment a FAILURE--and rescue
those of us who don't like living with a bunch of psychopaths!

[tavalon]

80. Never fear

The mothership is right under your feet and she will shake us off sooner rather than later. I hope she picks better for the top species next time.

[BiggJawn]

65. The cops weren't concerned.

He was already on the floor, unconscious and compliant.

[CoffeeCat]

67. I hope the cops checked his pants for videos!

You never know he might have been trying to steal! Well, did they search him???

:(

[AllyCat]

69. Good Samaritan side? Well, that side was shopping. Duh!

[Kablooie]

73. Everything in our society encourages greed, greed and more greed.

Capitalism is founded on the premise that people are greedy.

Advertising is designed to encourage and inflame greed.

Our greedy overlards want us all to become as greedy as they are because they can profit from it.

Helping other people is a great idea if there are decent profits to be made from it.

Greed even colors our fight over government 'entitlements'. We all want more.
(OK I know that's not completely true. We want enough for everyone, essentially and many of us have paid for it already but still I can't help feeling that greed is bubbling around down there somewhere too.)

Many of us fight our greedy urges so other urges, such as the urge to help others can emerge.
(urge, urge, urge, emerge. Hell, what an un-elegant sentence that turned out to be.)

But way too many in our country don't have the brains or desire to fight greed it so it continues as the dominant force in our society.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

77. Ahh, the holiday season ...

Just got to love that holiday spirit.

[Pacifist Patriot]

89. I highly recommend everyone read Plaid Adder's response at #29

[Chimichurri]

90. Right, because that's what Jesus would do.

:sarcasm:

[Hotler]

91. I have mine. Fuck the rest of you. eom.

[leftyladyfrommo]

99. Next someone is going to take a submachine gun into Walmart

and just gun down everyone in front of them.

People are so crazy sometimes.

[Response]

102. Every year things like this happen on black Friday, and

every year people act in disbelief that it is possible.

Black Friday should be removed by legislation if necessary. If stores/corporations can't or won't control their own environs then they shouldn't be allowed to endanger the public's well being.

How many times does this shizzle have to happen before it is taken seriously by the people and their elected officials?

Some dumb jerk takes steroids and they call federal commission to investigate it, but corporations know that what they are doing is wrong...evil and nary a peep comes from out congress critters.

It would take a handful of them being trampled in order for anything to be done about it, but as we all know they have little fear of being trampled on some corporate-sponsored junket.

[krabigirl]

104. Disgusting, the whole entire black Friday bs is so revolting.