Good Samaritan Checklist

Let's talk about the Good Samaritan Checklist. Now, this is the checklist that I want ya to think about and have in your head as a script that you can quickly run by in case you come up upon a situation where you might be compelled to act on behalf of a stranger in the public space. If you've prepared to defend yourself and those that you care about, you might also be capable of getting involved in a situation where someone that you didn't know prior to the event was in trouble and you might be able to help 'em. But first, I want you to ask three questions. First. Do you really know what's going on? Make sure you understand exactly what's going on, you're not interjecting into a situation where the person you think is the victim actually started the scenario. Make sure that you're not interacting in a situation which involves law enforcement, maybe a plain clothes security officer, or a plain clothes police officer engaged in their duties, and you think that potentially they're the bad guy. So make sure you know what's going on. The second thing you're gonna wanna do is ask yourself, can I really make things better? You don't wanna put yourself into a situation that may deescalate on its own, that maybe hasn't risen to a level where you need to interject yourself, or a situation which is now beyond the capacity of you to make it better. So if you're involved in a situation, or you're witnessing a situation that you're not involved in yet where your interjection is only gonna get more people hurt or put more people in danger, then ya probably don't wanna get involved. The third question is, what's the least you could do? What's the minimal way you could get involved in a situation? Maybe just standing off in a corner and yelling, maybe just letting someone know that they're being watched, maybe pulling out your phone, calling 911 and saying the police are on the way is enough to get a typical predator to stop victimizing whoever it is that they're harassing. Maybe it's a verbal situation that hasn't gotten physical. You can tell people, hey, I've called the police, you guys need to knock it off. Keep yourself out of harm's way, maybe even keep yourself out a visual reference, and know that you have done something to psychologically affect the bad guy's interest in continuing to be a bad guy. Now, obviously, if the situation from there escalates, you may need to change what you're doing. And the answer to that question, what is the least you can do, might change throughout a scenario. You may find yourself having pushed into a physical confrontation, and then realize that you could now back off, the least you could do is stop the physical confrontation. For example, if you break up a fight, someone's being victimized, and the other guy runs away, it's not your job to chase that person down. You've done the least you can do. So let's go over that again. The Good Samaritan Checklist. Are you sure you know what's going on? Can you actually make things better? And what's the least you can do? These are three good questions to be prepared to ask yourself before you act on the behalf of someone else in a public space.