Sheeple: “My instinct was to stay put and try to become as small as possible”

Imagine this, you are on a moving Metro Train and some crazed maniac starts stabbing someone in the middle of the car.  While this person is being stabbed to death, you and other passengers cower in fear on either side of the train simply hoping to shrink into a small enough space not to be noticed.  Once the maniac is done stabbing his victim to death he then starts to threaten and rob others, people who turn their face so as not to make eye contact while giving up whatever they have.  After all, this man has a knife (with blood on it), what else was there to possibly do?

If you are on this website reading this, chances are you wouldn’t have been one of the crowd to stand back and watch the above unfold.  It’s not a made up scenario either, it happened on July 4th on a Washington D.C. Metro train.

Excerpts from the story.

The passenger who was killed during a robbery aboard a Metro train on July 4 was punched until he fell and was then repeatedly stabbed in the chest, abdomen, back, side and arms, according to a D.C. police arrest affidavit filed in court on Tuesday.

The comments from those who were there are what’s worth reading.

“I watched [the attacker] drop-kick him in the head several times, like he wanted to kick his head off,” the woman said. “We saw the perpetrator kicking the man. He had him on the ground, punching him, kicking him and stabbing him.” She said Sutherland was “moaning a lot.. . .Never have in my life have I seen anything like this. I saw [the attacker] bent over him. I did see the bloody knife in his hand.”

As the attack unfolded, the woman pulled out her phone and called 911. She said there were about 10 passengers on the train car.

Good thing she called 911, when seconds count the police are mere minutes away.  The plot thickens.

The daughter said she had been standing with her back to Sutherland but turned when she saw people react to the attack.

She said others on the train were too afraid to try and stop the brutal attack.

“The man is holding a bloody knife,” she said. “I don’t think anyone was going to try and stop him.”

“The people that were in the back of the train stayed in the back of the train and the people in the front of the train stayed in the front of the train,” she said. “Knowing he had a knife in his hand…we were in a moving train. You’re not really sure what you need to do.”

“I would have to say that my instinct was to stay put and try to become as small as possible,” she said. “I’m looking, but I don’t want to be noticed by him.” 

After the attack, she said, the knife-wielding suspect walked past her to the front of the train, where he pushed another man up against the train wall and threatened him. The man’s wife, the woman said, had already gone to the train car in front to alert someone.

Then, she said, the man demanded money from her and her father.

“I really thought when he had my dad stand up and he was standing up close to him that he was going to knife him,” the woman said. “I didn’t know what he would do after he got money off my father.” Her father’s shirt, pants and wallet got blood on them.

When the train pulled into the NoMA-Gallaudet station, the attacker left.

[Emphasis Mine]  Source of Article

So let me get this straight.  Everyone cowers in fear and is afraid to help while a man gets stabbed to death.  Then a father does NOTHING to protect his daughter except tremble like a leaf while this dude robs him, what if he was stabbed next and then the daughter?

The Breakdown

A few points I should probably make here.

1- Obviously there are some areas of the country where you cannot legally carry a gun, D.C. being one of them.  I do think some of the laws reference CCW have changed there but I’m pretty certain those from other states cannot carry there, correct me if I”m wrong.

2- In any event it was obvious nobody had a gun on their person, option 1 down the drain.  Option 2 = get cut while subduing the attacker.  If you get in a knife fight you will get cut, and I just can’t fathom why a few people who were watching a man get stabbed to death didn’t tackle the assaulter.  Of course if one is familiar with a martial art (self defense, not that sport stuff) chances greatly increase of being able to stop the attack and take out the knife wielding maniac.  Still, SOMETHING could have been done…cowering in the corner like frightened sheep not being one of them.  This is what happens when we as a country assign titles like “courageous” and “fearless” and “hero” to acts that aren’t even close to resembling that, it waters down what it takes to truly battle the evil in the world.  It waters down what we as a society believe is an acceptable level of true bravery and aggression (read: none.  who needs aggression in a “civilized society.” /sarc) Ideals are peaceful, history is violent (quote from Brad Pitt in Fury).

3- You can’t count on the police!  There are some damn fine officers out there but they cannot be all places at all times.  Dialing 911 doesn’t stop someone from plunging a blade into someone else’s sternum.  Violence is only stopped with greater violence, than being violence of action which is swift and overwhelming.  One must be prepared to act and that doesn’t necessarily mean without fear.  Rarely is fear absent from the equation but if the training and determination are there, fear only serves to heighten one’s sense of awareness.

The Bottom Line

Why am I sharing this article, maybe I’m just preaching to the choir?  Yet I think it serves as a great example of what we must dedicate ourselves NOT to become (and I’m not talking about the criminal).  Train hard and be prepared to take action.  If you go down swinging, at least you put up a fight.  There is more honor in that than simply waiting to be slaughtered like a bunch of sackless sheeple.  If I was the guy who gave up my wallet to that thug with my daughter standing next to me, I’m not sure if I’d ever be able to look her in the face again as a father/protective figure.