The story of a woman raped on a Southeastern Pennsylvania Transport Authority (SEPTA) train in Philadelphia while onlookers reportedly recorded video with their cellphones but did not intervene or call 911 is mind-bogglingly horrific. It suggests not only a total disregard for women’s safety and wellbeing, but social disintegration; a disturbing impulse to filter terrible events through the lens of entertainment and shock value, and the disturbing ability to dehumanize suffering by mediating it through a screen.
The story of a woman raped on a Southeastern Pennsylvania Transport Authority (SEPTA) train in Philadelphia while onlookers reportedly recorded video with their cellphones but did not intervene or call 911 is mind-bogglingly horrific. It suggests not only a total disregard for women’s safety and wellbeing, but social disintegration; a disturbing impulse to filter terrible events through the lens of entertainment and shock value, and the disturbing ability to dehumanize suffering by mediating it through a screen.
