What would you do if you thought this child was being kidnapped? Social experiment prank

[The Straight Story]

What would you do if you thought this child was being kidnapped? Social experiment prank on YouTube shows public failing to stop child abduction


...

This very scenario is the one tested in a new video from Yousef Saleh Erakat a YouTube user who specialises in social experiment pranks that test the willingness of members of the public to intervene in a variety of stressful situations.

In the video the child, who is played by an actor called Nathan, approaches various adults and tells them a ‘man in a jacket’ is trying to put him in his car. The actor tells one couple: "He won’t stop chasing me".

Erakat, then approaches the group claiming to be the boy's father and says the boy has run off and is telling lies.

....

However, a number of people do intervene with one couple even using pepper spray to subdue the pretend abductor before the cameraman steps in and lets her in on the experiment.

Erakat wrote on his YouTube page that he wanted to make the videos because: "Growing up my biggest fear was getting kidnapped... This video was a way for me to express that fear in an artistic way and also spread positive change as to why it is important to ACT when put into these types of situations."

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/video-news/what-would-you-do-if-you-thought-this-child-was-being-kidnapped-social-experiment-prank-on-youtube-shows-public-failing-to-stop-child-abduction-29999429.html

[pipoman]

1. sounds like a good way to get hurt or killed

[brewens]

2. I was riding my bike one afternoon and saw a car suspiciously following a kid real slowly.

It was a little girl walking down the street and I noticed a guy n the car as I rode by. I turned around and circled back to check it out. As I did the guy rolled down his window having noticed what I did and also thinking that was maybe suspicious. About then I noticed the kid was carrying Girl Scout cookies so obviously it was her dad following along. He just said hi, kind of looking like he was wondering what I was going to do and I told him I noticed the car following and wanted to make sure everything was cool. He thanked me and said something like it's a good thing to notice and check out because you never know.

[d_r]

3. man I wouldn't do that around here

somebody's going to get shot

[Lurks Often]

4. Very good way to get hurt, arrested or killed

Some states allow the use of deadly force to prevent a kidnapping and I don't foresee many prosecutors or juries being especially sympathetic toward someone who faked a realistic kidnapping of a child and got hurt or arrested doing so.

[kiva]

5. So this guy does an experiment

in an artistic way, of course, and posts it on YouTube. So when a kid is actually in danger we can all think, "Ah, another artistic social experiment" and ignore the child. F-ing brilliant, but maybe Erakat is over his own fears