What Would You Do?, ABC’s pornographic take on how humans behave when they don’t think anybody is looking, should never really surprise anyone. Some of us are jerks! Some of us are meek! Some of us are willing to stand up and attempt to wrong a right! We learned this in May when an actor playing a homophobic restaurant server waiting on a gay family was sometimes confronted and sometimes ignored by neighboring diners. And on tonight’s episode, we’ll learn what happens when average Joes witness anti-gay bullying.
The prescient program — which had teenage actors playing both bullies and victims on a boardwalk in Long Beach, N.Y. — arrives just as First Lady Michelle Obama got done telling America today that adults need to teach their kids this type of behavior isn’t just inexcusable, it’s intolerable.
Not surprisingly, the regular response from passers-by who don’t intervene: they didn’t think it was their business. It’s all of ours.
Joe
Good for that guy. It is ALL of our responsibility to look out for those who are being bullied. If you see something like that happen, and you do nothing, you’re just as bad as the people doing the bullying.
Kev C
I learned from this clip that staged bullying is lame and phony.
Tim
Very telling of real human compassion
– people passed by the young guy repeatedly being verbally bullied by a group of guys
but (in another segment during the show) jumped in to rescue a dog from being taken.
Kieran
Thanks ABC for hammering home the stereotype of the poor, pathetic, weak, defenseless gay boy who needs to depend upon the kindness of straight strangers to save him. NEWSFLASH: Nobody respects weakness in this world…..whether they be gay or straight. People respect strength. People respect those who stand up for themselves and fight back when necessary.