Bill Nye collapses. Audience tweets about it instead of helping him

[Courtesy Flush]

Last night in front of an audience of hundreds at a presentation at the University of Southern California, TV personality Bill Nye — popularly known as the "Science Guy" — collapsed midsentence as he walked toward a podium. Early indications are that Nye is OK, but what's odd about the incident isn't so much Nye's slight health setback as the crowd's reaction. Or, more precisely, its nonreaction, according to several accounts.

It appears that the students in attendance, rather than getting up from their seats to rush to Nye's aid, instead pulled out their mobile devices to post information about Nye's loss of consciousness.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20101117/sc_yblog_thelookout/if-the-science-guy-passes-out-and-nobody-tweets-it-did-it-happen

[SoCalDem]

1. Oh NO!.. I hope he's ok

:scared:

[sakabatou]

4. Me too

But those audience members are jerkwads.

[DainBramaged]

2. A generation of ignorance, afraid to help lest they be 'involved'

thanks uber-stupid parents.

[rfranklin]

3. No, it's just that those I phones are more addictive than heroin...

Just watch the way people compulsively check their phone and answer any stupid text that comes in.

[TwilightGardener]

5. Sad--losing our humanity. More important to be the first with the gossip than help.

[uppityperson]

6. I hope he recovers quickly

[superduperfarleft]

7. Oh noez! Kids these days! When I was a kid.,..!

"nobody went to his aid at the very beginning when he first collapsed — that just perplexed me beyond reason." The student added, "Instead, I saw students texting and updating their Twitter statuses. It was just all a very bizarre evening."

One anecdote does not a terrifying trend make. They very well may have been doing this while he was speaking and didn't even notice. Nevermind the fact that the last thing he needed was HUNDREDS of people rushing the stage to "come to his aid." Sometimes, the best thing to do is to get the hell out of the way and let someone far more qualified than you handle it.

But it's a day that ends in "y," so we have to have another misinformed, hysterical article about how teh evil technology is going to spell doom for us all. :eyes:

[canoeist52]

9. You are the voice of reason in this thread.

[superduperfarleft]

10. This is the fourth thread just today, and not just on this board,

where I got to sit back and watch a mob of irrational knee-jerkers completely work themselves into a froth over nothing.

Now THAT is a phenomenon worth looking into.

[xultar]

11. ABSO FUCKING LOOTELY +99999 gazillion trillion billion brazillions

[Kennah]

8. So reminds me of Bobcat Goldthwait ...

... when he quoted Rodney King to George Holliday, "Heh man, can you put down the camera and help me."

[Gidney N Cloyd]

12. Remember Dick Shawn?

"On April 17, 1987, while performing on stage at UC San Diego's Mandeville Hall, Shawn began a comedy bit about himself and the audience surviving nuclear war. At one point in the act, Shawn portrayed a politician reciting campaign clichés, including: "If elected, I will not lay down on the job"; later, when he collapsed face down on the stage, the audience thought it was part of the act, unaware that he had actually suffered a massive heart attack (See Tommy Cooper for a similar onstage death).

"After some time had gone by, there were catcalls. Finally, someone appeared on stage, knelt down to examine Shawn, stood up and asked: "Is there a doctor in the house?" Another person came on stage, turned him over and began administering CPR. The audience was told to go home, but almost no one left since it appeared to be part of Shawn's act. When paramedics arrived, bewildered audience members began leaving, still unsure of what they had witnessed. A notice in the following day's San Diego Union newspaper clarified that Shawn had indeed died during the performance.<2> Dick Shawn was 63."

[Manifestor_of_Light]

13. Leonard Warren died on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera.

During a performance of La Forza del Destino. That was in 1960.

www.leonardwarren.org