Should — or even could — someone have done more to try to save subway victim Ki Suk Han?
Even top ethics experts yesterday seemed split over the extent of other riders’ moral responsibility to get involved in the events that led to Monday’s tragedy.
“It’s always a difficult problem for New Yorkers: At what point do you intevene? At what point do you get involved?’’ said Dr. Anne Klaeysen, leader of the New York Society for Ethical Culture.
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The situation was “just loaded with ethical dilemmas,’’ from whether someone should have stepped in while Han and his emotionally disturbed attacker were arguing, to whether more could have been done to save the victim once he was pushed onto the tracks in front of an oncoming train.
“In that moment, you always have the fight or flight. There’s a lot of territory in between,’’ Klaeysen said.
But “it takes [just] one person to say, ‘Let’s help. let’s do this together.’
“I would never stand in judgment,’’ she said. “I empathize with those there, and I don’t know what I would have done.
“But had they assessed the situation, once he’s on the tracks, for goodness sake, reach your arm out!’’
Dr. Celia Fisher, director of the Center for Ethics Education at Fordham University, said it’s nice to think you might have done things differently, but chances are, you probably wouldn’t have, because it goes against human instinct to put yourself in harm’s way, even to help someone else.
“We certainly have a moral obligation as human beings to help people if we can,’’ she said.
But “unlike policemen or soldiers who are very well-trained in an emergency situation where there are competing emotions to help and fear, you can be frozen.
“Also, there’s something called the diffusion of responsibility: The more people there are around, the more unlikely they are to act on their own. They think somebody else is going to do it or can do it better.’’