1 post tagged “helping”

Problem: teenage girl takes a huge tumble off her bicycle on Wellington Road, near the traffic lights, as she heads east.
   Here are the issues that raises. First: I was the only motorist who stopped and this was around 4.40 p.m. In other words, there would have been plenty more who would have witnessed the high school student having her fall, especially on a road designated as part of the State Highway.
   Secondly, being a man, I can’t touch her, especially when she says it’s her thigh that hurts. In an age of political correctness, you can no longer care or even make contact. The best I could do was lift up her bike, though I offered the usual help (‘Can I call your parents?’).
   The only other person who came to her aid was a woman living nearby, who asked if she wanted to rest up in her home before she made the rest of the way back. She declined, though as I left I did see her make a cellphone call, probably to family.
   I am glad that she was wearing a helmet, mandatory in New Zealand for cyclists.
   But I am a little annoyed that we didn’t get an extra motorist stopping, and that I felt uncomfortable, because of all the news about bleeding nonces and sexual harassment, that I couldn’t take this girl by the hand and help her up unless she asked first. I felt a bit easier when I had the woman come by and offer her help because at least there was a witness. I look back and I do not know where the boundaries lie any more.
   When fear of the law prevents us from acting as humanely as our instincts will us to, something is wrong.