Canada: Bystanders ignore plight of burning homeless man

The Times Colonist ^ | December 14, 2005 | Maurice Bridge

[Stoat]

Bystanders ignore plight of burning homeless man

 

 

Christine Wellstead, an emergency room nurse at St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver, stands near an alcove outside a Starbucks where she doused a homeless man whose comforter caught fire while he was sleeping.

Photograph by : Ian Smith, CanWest News Service

 

 

 

 

Maurice Bridge, CanWest News Service

Published: Wednesday, December 14, 2005

VANCOUVER -- St. Paul's emergency nurse Christine Wellstead has seen some pretty rough things on the job, but nothing has shaken her as much as the callous indifference she witnessed Monday night as bystanders ignored an unconscious homeless man wrapped in a burning comforter.

Wellstead was on her way home from work around 10:30 p.m. when she stopped at Starbucks at 19th and Cambie for a coffee. Smelling smoke, she walked outside to see what was burning, but all she could see was a woman sitting at an outside table, talking calmly on her phone as clouds of smoke rolled past her.

"She's on her cellphone, having her coffee and she's sitting amongst this acrid smoke," she said.

Looking further, Wellstead found a man slumped on a bench in a nearby alcove on the side street, wrapped in a comforter that was on fire.

"It was smouldering, and it was by his face," she said. "It was all orange, and there was smoke. I threw the blanket on the ground and tried to wake him up, but he didn't wake up."

She ran back into Starbucks for water to put out the fire, and that's when she got a real shock.

She said another woman customer standing at the counter told her: "Just leave him alone, he's a homeless person," Wellstead recalled. "I looked at her and I said, 'What are you talking about?'

"And she says, 'He's homeless, just forget it.' "

Appalled, Wellstead rushed back out with water to douse the fire and still couldn't wake the man, so she ran inside again and asked a barista to call for help.

"I said, 'You'd better call an ambulance, because I can't wake him up,' and the lady [customer] said, 'Don't call the hospital, they don't want him,' and I just looked at her, and I said, 'I work at the hospital and yeah, we want him.' "

Wellstead finally woke the man and got him sitting up as they waited for the ambulance. He told her he was prone to seizures and believed he had one while he was smoking, wrapped in his comforter against the night chill.

Wellstead said she didn't believe he suffered serious burns. The fire and ambulance crews who answered the call were great, she said, and treated him with respect as they took him away to St. Paul's Hospital.

The ambulance service confirmed a man was taken to St. Paul's after the incident. CanWest News could not obtain information on his condition Tuesday.

The well-dressed customer who made the callous remarks sat alone in her car at the curb, sipping her coffee and watching as the event unfolded.

Wellstead went home, but she was still upset Tuesday morning. "I can't get my head around it," she said. "I'm so upset. I was almost in tears.

"I know there are a lot of homeless people here and I know some of them can be annoying, but this was a human being.

"His blanket was on fire."

[goldstategop]

The entire idea of putting someone on the dole sounds good in theory. Of course in reality you're destroy a person's self-sufficiency and dignity. They're dying slowly from within. Conservatives want to give people the inner life they deserve, not merely that which people see on the outside - and we get denounced for being heartless. A human being is not just defined by the possessions he has but by the the things people don't often stop to think about - like the soul.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie.Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[Stoat]

You're on Free Republic and you're still a twit.

 

[beaver fever]

Funny.

I'm not sure what it means but it's funny.

[goldstategop]

Uh huh... the ideal of 19th Century Marxism and the Young Hegelians was human emancipation. We are not free until we are the captains of our own fate. Our work is not really ours until its the spontaneous product of our own intelligence and creativity and it exalts all the potential we are capable of. Freedom is at its essence, freedom from being dominated by the material world, by nature, by want and by hunger. It means Man qua Man is true to himself as he is and that Man can make the world rather than be made by the world. Of course, all that has been forgotten by the Left as well as the point: previous philosophers have interpreted the world; the task of philosophy today is to change it.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie.Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[beaver fever]

That falls under the category of self estrangement AKA the lumpen proletariat who actively reinforce their own oppression.

Which is kinda what street people do. They construct a survivalist economy that is 'invisible' to the rest of society.

Some make a go of it and some die.

BTW I find most street people to be rather polite and quite thankful when you give them some beer bottles and a little bit of change.

[Stoat]

I'm not sure what it means but it's funny.

I'm glad that you liked it.  :-)

I post that pic whenever I perceive a 'blossoming argument'.  The reason being is that I have found the FR "Administrators" to be utterly ruthless when administering what they perceive to be their brand of justice, which often involves pulling an entire thread for 'whatever' reason and never bothering with a coherent explanation. I have had several threads pulled and have never been offered even the barest suggestion of a courteous or meaningful explanation.

I am truly enjoying your posts as well as everyone else's, and I am hoping that this thread won't be pulled because "somebody" thinks that the FR ban on 'personal attacks' is being violated.

No offense was intended, please carry on   :-)

[grey_whiskers]

The entire idea of putting someone on the dole sounds good in theory. Of course in reality you're destroy a person's self-sufficiency and dignity. They're dying slowly from within. Conservatives want to give people the inner life they deserve, not merely that which people see on the outside - and we get denounced for being heartless. A human being is not just defined by the possessions he has but by the the things people don't often stop to think about - like the soul.

Agree in many ways, not all.

Liberals seemingly think that all the members of the preferred victim classes need is CASH and UNDERSTANDING. They think implicitly that most people have the habits and attitudes of the upper middle class, and have just run into "bad luck."

Conservatives have it correct that you can coddle people with too much touchy-feely, and that govt. screws up things and people. And they are correct that self-reliance (in the main) is the way to go about things.

But they are both missing out that many of the underclass have never had any good examples, many have chemical dependencies or mental problems, and many have never been loved in their lives, and demonstrate this fact by many self-destructive tendencies. Which they cling to even after being told better (so much for the condescending liberal public service ads which say 'the more you know...').

So merely giving them 'tough love' is not enough, they need LOVE period (see also the Church...)

These folk need to be rebuilt from the inside--as one character in a novel said:

"Get a new soul. That thing's not fit for a dog."

[M203M4]

NOTHING justifies leaving someone burning in the gutter. That unnamed woman is a repulsive human being. I pray she is never in a situation where her life depends on the assistance of another, and she is not deemed "worthy" of their help. Ugh, disgusting whore. *spit*

And to the nurse who helped, thank you.

As others have said on this thread, too many people (especially in Canada) think that the government will solve all problems, and that they are individually responsible for little.

[tfecw]

Imagine that, an alcoholic who is happy you gave him booze. Do you pass out cigarettes to the lung cancer patients in the cancer ward? I be they are dying for one.

[goldstategop]

Alienation is a question that's exercised history's best minds. But I think there is general agreement today state socialism never resolved the issue. It simply exchanged one form of alienation for another. And the costs of equality were quite simply unacceptable. The loss of freedom and self-rule wasn't worth the price of a centrally planned society. And the few Communist regimes left in existence today all lead an impoverished existence.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie.Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[Alberta's Child]

At least Alberta premier Ralph Klein had the decency to openly berate those men at the homeless shelter after a "campaign appearance" at the bar next door.

One of the great moments in modern politics . . . "How the hell can you be homeless when there are more jobs than people in this province?"

[M203M4]

I think he means empty bottles, for the recycling deposit...

[indcons]

I'm from Vancouver. Those "people" are a nusience. They're scum. I can fully understand why no one would care.
And you wouldn't mind a human being burning to death. I wish you a Merry Christmas, FRiend.

[beaver fever]

'blossoming argument'

Heh Heh. You said blossom.

What I like about your post is that hit on the highlights of strong willed Black women. I always love those 'in your face' exchanges.

eg Diffn't Strokes

[NewsJunqui]

Steet people panhandle or collect bottles and used clothing. I know because there at least 10 regulars within 2 blocks of my apartment.

I'm in Vancouver a couple times a year and the number of homeless is staggering to me, and I'm from Chicago. We often have meetings that go late and end up out for dinner @ 9-10PM. Granville is unbelievable at night.

Just an observation from an American who can't understand with the near-socialist government of BC why the level of homelessness seems higher than the US. Oh, BTW, my car was broken into as well at the Fairmont garage.

[tfecw]

oooh :)

That makes more sense then.

[indcons]

"Am I on FreeRepublic or DU here?"

Good luck tring to figure that out. I'm sure you'll find the answer one day.

[VeniVidiVici]

Homeless in Toronto.

Should be worth a drippy movie.

[M203M4]

Other Canadian cities have been known to give away at homeless shelters one way bus tickets to Vancouver. It is also a city of very mild climate compared to the rest of Canada (an extra big plus if you are homeless).

Of course, it is extremely expensive to live in Vancouver, so it is nearly impossible to pull yourself up while there. :(

[Porterville]

Heartless blood suckers to the north. savages.