So by now you have probably seen or at least heard about that horrendous NY Post cover picture where a man is staring into the face of death.  In the off shoot that you are a troll living under a bridge and are not aware of this story, yet just happened to get a hold of an Iphone to read my blog post, but are getting the screen all sticky with your troll drool, I will quickly explain.  A man was pushed into the subway tracks in New York City, and while he is trying desperately to crawl to safety, someone took his picture.  Although sadly, people had time to capture this moment, no one had time to save him, and the man was killed.

When I saw this picture I was more disturbed by the sight of the inevitable, then if I had seen a mangled body already hit by the train.  The fact that the image was captured Nano seconds before his death is by far more sinister then seeing an actual dead body.  There is something so emotionally wrenching about this picture because you can actually feel his fear.  My empathetic self can relate more deeply to a man facing his death then to a lifeless body already gone.  Looking at death almost seems fake.  Like when you go to a wake, and stare into the emptiness, the shell that was once your loved one.   It just doesn’t seem real.  Once someone is dead, it is so outside of my spectrum of understanding that although I feel immense sadness, I can’t imagine what is really going on.  I feel distant despite the fact I am devastated the person has passed.  But the visual of someone about to die, and being able to sense their terror, is something I can connect to in an intimate way.  I think that is why people are so outraged.  It is just too visceral to deal with.

So of course people are going to criticize how someone could capture this moment, but not act.  I obviously have that same question, and would like to think I would have done something beyond finding the best Instagram filter.  But I think the greater issue is here what makes someone a hero, and others just bystanders.

There is another story of a subway that has always stuck with me.  A man, with his two young daughters witnesses another man having convulsions and falling into the tracks.  He then jumps down, pulls the man to the side, and lays on top of him covering him with his own body as the train drives over them.  As they were lying under the tracks he yelled up to the bystanders that they were both safe, but to please tell is daughters not to worry because daddy is fine.  WHAAAAAAAAT???

This got me thinking of the psychology of a hero.  My feeling is, the type of person who acts in a situation like that does so not because they aren’t scared, but because they couldn’t live with themselves if they did nothing.  They have enough foresight to know that although they are putting themselves in danger, they would rather that take that risk than live the rest of their life feeling the regret.