McDonald’s patrons snap pics of choking tyke instead of helping her

[Liberal_in_LA]

When a 3-year-old girl lost consciousness while choking at a British McDonalds, customers snapped to action – by whipping out their cell phones to capture her in distress.





Millie Wise was enjoying Chicken McNuggets with her grandma Sandra Longmoor in Hartlepool on Tuesday when a piece became lodged in her windpipe and she began to choke and convulse, the Mirror reported.

Like a band of McGhouls, other diners took to recording Millie’s emergency rather than providing first aid — or calling for help.

But staffers at the Middleton Grange shopping center jumped to action and Millie was rushed to a hospital, where she recovered from the ordeal.

“It is unbelievable that people would watch a thing like that and their first instinct was not to call help but to take pictures and video,” said her mom, Claire Wise, 35.

http://nypost.com/2016/09/09/mcdonalds-patrons-snap-pics-of-choking-tyke-instead-of-helping-her/

I am disgusted that people recorded such a traumatic incident while my mam and Millie were suffering such an awful ordeal.

"I am so grateful to the security guard, the staff and other members of the public who came to help, without them I couldn't imagine would might have happened."

Millie and Sandra, 62, who looks after Millie four days a week, were eating in the McDonald's branch on Tuesday when the tot started to choke.

Sandra began shouting for help and a McDonald's member of staff tried to use first aid to remove the blockage without success.

Steve Dawking, 42, the emergency first aider at Middleton Grange was alerted and quickly found Millie as he was guided there by colleague Adam Goodwin in the centre's CCTV room
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/sick-mcdonalds-diners-filmed-three-8798482

[malaise]

1. Some humans are sick

Rec

[Fred Sanders]

3. Smartphones are making people the opposite of smart, I would say.

[narnian60]

6. Well said.

[davidn3600]

2. Classic case of "Diffusion of responsibility"

Diffusion of responsibility[1] is a sociopsychological phenomenon whereby a person is less likely to take responsibility for action or inaction when others are present. Considered a form of attribution, the individual assumes that others either are responsible for taking action or have already done so.[2] The phenomenon tends to occur in groups of people above a certain critical size and when responsibility is not explicitly assigned. It rarely occurs when the person is alone and diffusion increases with groups of three or more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_responsibility

This is a real phenomenon. In fact when I took first-aid training recently, one of the first things you are supposed to do in an emergency is to ACTUALLY POINT TO SOMEONE and command them to call 911. The reason why is because you have now assigned that responsibility and that person is more likely to carry out the action. If you were to just yell "someone call 911," there is a chance nobody would.

A few years ago there was a surveillance video in the news where an old man fell in the street. People would walk by, cars would drive by, no one stopped to do anything until eventually a cop car happened to come by.

[dixiegrrrrl]

5. You are so correct.

I have been in several situations where a small crowd gathered in a medical emergency, and directing people to do something explicit worked.

A lot of times people do not know what to do at all, thus are afraid to do anything.

But my experiences were before the ubiquitous cell phone craze.

[SixString]

4. People suck.

http://www.peoplesuckmusical.com/

[lpbk2713]

7. Life is just a spectator sport for some folks.

I'm glad Millie came out of it OK.