The madness of crowds.

[trof]

Watching a documentary about Lincoln's assassination on the History channel.
After Lincoln had been removed from Ford's theater, the angry crowd that had gathered outside threatened to burn the building down.
:shrug:

[Az]

1. We are a species that copies others of our species

Add stress and as unpredictible behaviour results more and more people emulate it. This continues until apparent insanity ensues.

[trof]

2. You said a mouthful.

Ain't it the truth.

[Deja Q]

3. Threatening the burning John Wilkes Booth may have been a better thing to do...

:shrug:

Insane, yes, but at least comparatively relevant to burning down a useful building.

[trof]

14. Yeah, what's the sense in that?

nuts

[cwydro]

4. I really hate crowds

make me nervous...is there a name for that I wonder?

[trof]

5. crowd phobia:

Crowds or mobs- Enochlophobia, Demophobia or Ochlophobia.

[cwydro]

6. OK, I did not know that

I can add it to my other phobias...:P

[trof]

12. The miracle of google.

[trof]

7. Mary Serrat first woman to be executed in U.S.

One of Booth's 'co-conspirators'.
Hung.

[trof]

10. They tied a rope around her skirts so nothing 'intimate' would be seen

when she dropped.
It was a sunny day, so they also held an umbrella over her so she wouldn't suffer sunstroke before she was hanged.

[redqueen]

8. scary things, large crowds

[Deja Q]

9. Quite.

On the plus side, nobody has yet to threaten the burning of a store because they just sold out of Elmo dolls...

[trof]

13. You may be giving people ideas.

;-)

[Deja Q]

19. I doubt it.

History repeats itself. That's not my problem. I control myself. I can't control others and too many can't seem to control themselves. That's not my problem.

Observing and commenting is not the same thing as doing.

Though I can advise them not to do it.

Other people have already done far worse for less reason. (e.g. robbing Black Friday shoppers in the checkout queues...)

Besides, me of all people give people ideas? I can't even convince them to date me.

[redqueen]

15. hahahahaha

give it time...

weren't there near riots over furbys?

[trof]

16. And Playstations.

whew

[BarenakedLady]

17. No shit

Though even the mall and grocery store are too many people for me to deal with without medication...but then again I'm a freak. :silly:

[RebelOne]

11. It's the mob mentality. n/t

[trof]

18. Anybody ever been involved in a real mob situation?

[redqueen]

20. nearly

we were at the state fair, and the kids were young, so it was extra scary. it was the day that schools allow a day off for kids to go, and so it was packed. we were near the cotton bowl and some sort of commotion broke out and the cops on horseback started riding around more purposefully. i wasn't close enough to see what was going on, but suddenly people started flooding from the cotton bowl area away towards the midway... in a very haphazard and dangerous way. escaping like. we managed to get around to the side of a game booth so the scary runny people just flew past us. it occurred to me that we might want to run as well, but it seemed that not running with all the people might actually be safer. never did find out what everyone was running away from so quickly.