Base Commander: Anything I do at this point will only make things worse. Anything! Chief of Police: Many people would charge in anyway. Base Commander: Oh, the urge to do something during an emergency is very strong. It takes training and discipline to do nothing.
It seems to me that this is related to the idea of roles. If you don’t see yourself as being responsible for handling emergencies, you probably won’t do anything about them, hoping someone else will. But if you do see yourself as being the person responsible for handling a crisis situation, then you’re a lot more likely to do something about it, because you’ve taken that responsibility upon yourself.
It’s a particularly nuanced response to both take that kind of responsibility for a situation, and then, after carefully evaluating the options, decide that the best course is to do nothing, since it conflicts with that cultivated need to respond. That said, it could easily be a better choice than the alternative of making a probably-bad decision in the spur of the moment with incomplete information. Used properly, it’s a level above the position of decisive but unplanned action… though on the surface, it can be hard to distinguish from the default bystander position of passing off responsibility.
I don’t entirely agree with them. Dr. Bowmen knows that the they won’t do anything, which is why he started messing with Florence in the first place. If they made a habit of doing something during an emergency, Dr. Bowmen would stop causing them.
Dr. Bowmen is consistently two steps ahead of the base commander. Instead of not causing emergencies, he might just leave better traps. Or nastier ones.
They need to make a habit of doing things that are difficult to take advantage of. If doing nothing and charging in are both equally easy to take advantage of, they could try flipping a coin to decide whether or not to charge in.
Freefall by Mark Stanley.
Huh. My default reaction during an emergency is to freeze out like a deer in the headlights.
It seems to me that this is related to the idea of roles. If you don’t see yourself as being responsible for handling emergencies, you probably won’t do anything about them, hoping someone else will. But if you do see yourself as being the person responsible for handling a crisis situation, then you’re a lot more likely to do something about it, because you’ve taken that responsibility upon yourself.
It’s a particularly nuanced response to both take that kind of responsibility for a situation, and then, after carefully evaluating the options, decide that the best course is to do nothing, since it conflicts with that cultivated need to respond. That said, it could easily be a better choice than the alternative of making a probably-bad decision in the spur of the moment with incomplete information. Used properly, it’s a level above the position of decisive but unplanned action… though on the surface, it can be hard to distinguish from the default bystander position of passing off responsibility.
I don’t entirely agree with them. Dr. Bowmen knows that the they won’t do anything, which is why he started messing with Florence in the first place. If they made a habit of doing something during an emergency, Dr. Bowmen would stop causing them.
Dr. Bowmen is consistently two steps ahead of the base commander. Instead of not causing emergencies, he might just leave better traps. Or nastier ones.
Or he might just arrange to have the Base Commander fired and replaced.
Or he would take advantage of what they would predictably do.
They need to make a habit of doing things that are difficult to take advantage of. If doing nothing and charging in are both equally easy to take advantage of, they could try flipping a coin to decide whether or not to charge in.