The only way to call the police anonymously is to find a payphone in a place with no surveillance cameras or from a cellphone with a foreign, non-registered SIM card. If you call from you home or your cellphone they have your number and therefore your name and address.

Let's make it personnal, shawl we?

Let's imagine that you and your better half (she really is the better half! ) have a daughter. You know she has problem with her husband and it is killing you. Imagine that she gets beat up outside her house by her husband and someone saw it but walk away and never called the police.

As a father, will you think it was a good idea for the witness to stay away to the point of not even being able to make a phone call to help your daughter?

Let's not, shall we?

I think the police should have been called if not for the woman's sake but for the child's sake. That poor kid is most likely living in this nightmare and perhaps getting beat up by this guy. If he'd treat his wife this way, can you imagine what he could do to that little boy? Unfortunately there are too many stupid women stay with a guy like this not caring what it does to a child. Most kids growing up in a situation like this will become abusers themselves.

Not calling the police when somebody is in distress because of the potential repercussions (that only happen in movies) is an act of idiocy. It has nothing to do with being a big brave hero but much rather with being a human being and reacting to somebody needing help. Maybe some day, you're the one needing help.

You can only hope for somebody to help out in situations but not demand any passerby to always take action. It's difficult though to judge the whole situation. If something like that happened to beloved one surely I would have been very furious. At the same time would be right to blame citizens for not intervening? Police is the only answer - special peace enforcing squad paid by us tax payers to deal with any incidents including domestic violence. That's at least ideal picture how it should function in modern society. How capable is police to be always on time that's whole another story...

Civil duty and consciousness would dictate to call police (and take blame and shame of impact later). But go and try to be hero and take law in your own hands - wrong idea!

That is untrue. Repercussions take place in the real world to real people who thought they were merely doing their civic duty.

Getting involved really isn't worth it, unless you are sure you - and your family - can handle the consequences.

Why not? Because your answer and reaction would be different? Better to not sit down and think about something that could affect us to a very personal level.

Easier to walk away.

..I'm sure you'd be saying the same thing when your head is getting splattered on the concrete.

DB's avatar may be an actor, but I'll take his word that he has experience in this, i.e. getting involved, and it had bad repercussions for him and/or his loved ones. Why is that getting under everybody's skin, that he did something to help, or that he did and was taught not to do it again ? At least not in a manner that could come back to him?

Calling the police can have repercussions but that doesn't mean it's the wrong move, nor does it mean it's always an obvious thing to do - the way you know that is how the mafia have existed in the US for so long. The repercussions are one factor in the decision making process of whether to call the police. In my case, I would call the police because I believe the risk to myself and my family is worth the chance of repercussions. I would make my concerns known to the police from the outset and ask that they take special consideration of this.

There is no obvious choice here and if I lived in an open street and had kids or parents living with me or close by, my decision might be different.

Yah... could, could, could.

I'm talking about did, did, did.

But you go ahead and live in the world of hypothetical situations, if you like.

It must be lovely there.

... after getting involved in someone else's business.

Because regardless of his having learned the hard way, it's not a message I care to spread to others. Imagine living in a world where nobody helped you when you were in need - it's not the kind of world I'd want.

This sort of topic is one of the few where I find Switzerland lacking. Where I grew up (with a bunch of rednecks in Wisconsin) I think the dangers of meddling were rather higher on average than here, but we were still taught to help out, regardless of the cost. It's a rough world, but we all need to do our part to make it right.

Edit: to be clear, I'm not knocking DB here, as I haven't read 3 pages of this thread (happy to knock him elsewhere ). I'm saying that in principle, I don't want to spread the message that it's ok to ignore violence in order to save your own skin. I'd rather people were willing to take risks, even knowing the possible outcomes, to help their fellow man.

..or being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

So difficult to understand where you stand without knowing the circumstances. I won't judge.
However I do wonder if you would feel different if your loved ones, children, grand-children were the ones being duffed up? How would you feel if something terrible happened to them and you knew that some just stood by and did nothing (not even a call to the police)?

very true, and contributing to the world I live is the reason I'd call the police in the first place. I can't comment on Wisconsin but I've seen a bar fight in London where a third party intervened and both participants of the fight suddenly turned on the third party. Getting involved in a situation about which next to nothing is known is to be done with sober consideration and often as not can escalate things.

Darling it is all hypothetical! This is what we talk most of the time in here! You are the king of making hypothesis when you want to proof your points, so play it both side. You are creating an hypothetical situation when you say that being in this exact situation of the OP, it COULD turn bad to him and his family.

So why don't you answer me?

DB didn't say Don't Do It, he merely said from experience he wouldn't, again. I think the point was to warn that you may be sticking your neck out a bit further than thought, and beyond that, the necks of those close to you. A head's up, if you will.

Does anyone else have personal experience with getting involved in violent family affairs of others?

Absolutely - that's one of the risks. And other times, it can save a person's life. I consider the phone call to the police (mentioned ad nauseum elsewhere, apparently) to be the bare minimum. But I would also consider it my civic duty to step in if she was getting slapped up.

Mind you, the decision would be a hell of a lot easier to make if I was there alone or with some buddies than if my girlfriend was walking alongside me (and was a potential target). I recognize that - life isn't full of easy to make choices. But I still think it would be the right thing to do, regardless of whether I did it or not.