Video: What Would You Do If You Saw A Murder In Progress?

What would you do if you happened upon a murder in progress? Call the police? Try to help? Or just walk away? That’s exactly what New York viral video agency Thinkmodo hoped to discover when it planned a social experiment in which it faked a murder in an elevator—just to see how people would react. The video, now posted by BeatriceRevenge on YouTube, shows a variety of reactions.

Most people were horrified to see one man violently strangling another when the elevator doors opened, and quite a few tried to help. Unfortunately, several simply ran away, hopefully to call the police soon after… but who knows. What’s more surprising is the calm displayed by some when they saw the scene and slowly backed away from it.

Showing true heroism, one woman started beating the assailant with her bouquet and another with her grocery sack. A pair of men worked as a team to help the “victim” as one held the elevator door open and the other ran to get a fire extinguisher, hoping the spray would deter the would-be murder long enough for help to arrive. Another woman tried dragging the victim out of the elevator. Two dogs tried desperately o help, even though their owner wanted to run. And, of course, there had to be a guy who only wanted to snap a pic with his phone.

So the question on all on all our minds… What would you do?