Call me a coward if you wish, but the wise thing to do is to distance yourself from the situation and contact the authorities. I would be in no way equipped to intervene and would probably end up getting hurt. This isn’t some situation where all it takes is a good samaritan to swoop in and save people.

The most reasonable thing to do is to call the police and leave it to those who have the official capacity to get involved.

Police hardly care. They'll arrive 15 minutes after someone has been beaten within an inch of their life, take a report, and do no investigating. CCTV that captured the whole thing? They won't even bother to collect it. That's too much work. Have seen this first hand. A good samaritan can make a real difference in the moment, with some large personal risk to themselves of course. The least you can do is make noise and make it clear that the police are coming.

I disagree.

Regardless, recording it for social media is beyond spineless- it’s downright dystopian. I think you know this though ;)

I couldn’t walk past a scene like that and not be compelled to take some action. Honestly I’d probably do something similar: document it in someway, involve the authorities, try to enact change.

What a appalling representation of humanity.

I’ve been to SF around 8x in 10 years. I remember SF locals literally stepping over homeless people lying on the ground as they exited a Starbucks.

Documenting it is the least someone can do.

> Documenting it is the least someone can do.

Not only is pulling out your cellphone at the sight of violence so you can post it on twitter not deplorable, it's actually heroic. Now I've heard it all.