Texan Who Jumped into Disneyland Brawl Has Important Message for America
At crunch time, Jason Blair didn’t have any doubts.
When he came upon Saturday’s family brawl at California’s Disneyland that shocked the country, the high school football coach didn’t hesitate for second before taking action.
In an interview Tuesday night on Fox News, he had no problem explaining why — and it’s an explanation all Americans need to hear.
First, Blair said, he saw a man striking a woman, and children in danger.
“My instinct was, that shouldn’t happen and something needed to take place,” Blair told “The Ingraham Angle” host Laura Ingraham.
“I saw those kids there. I just felt I had to get in there and break everything up.”
Check out the interview here:
There was a time not so long ago when that would have been a universal reaction among men who saw that kind of behavior taking place — especially in a place like Disneyland, which was basically built for families to enjoy together.
But, as Ingraham pointed out, Blair was one of the few men who felt that way. Many people who were confronted with the obscene spectacle of a man beating a woman in a public place — regardless of the circumstances — chose to take an obscene route of their own: utter passivity.
“There were a lot of men in that video, and they’re videoing. and not thinking for a second [about intervening]. Maybe they’re worried about getting sued. Maybe they’re worried about getting hit. Or maybe they’re worried about posting on social media,” Ingraham said.
“Who taught you your values?” she asked Blair. “Your parents? Where’d you learn them?”
Blair’s answer was pure gold — and a lesson fathers and mothers should be teaching their children from infancy: We all have a duty to make the world a better place.
“It’s one of the things that I preach to my kids, and I preach to my team that I coach. You know? Do the right thing, step in,” Blair said.
“There are small little segments that you can step in and be a hero, but we should be helping our fellow man, not hindering him and filming him and being on a cell phone. To me, that was baffling.”
It was baffling to some on social media as well.
This man was brave and honorable to step in but what’s sad is that not too long ago more people would have pounced on this situation long before anyone got hurt. Today, our society is about recording activities and not being a part of it. Too many directors and not enough actors
— Jeffrey Maniff (@jsman24) July 10, 2019
This isn’t to say vigilante justice is the way things ought to be.
There are people with the training and authority to step into a situation that poses a danger to the innocent: Parks have security guards, society has cops. They have a job to do, and they usually do it well.
But there are times, like Saturday, when they’re not around. There are times when all a person is faced with is a clear wrong — like a man physically attacking a woman and putting children in danger.
That’s crunch time — and everyone should remember the lesson Blair preaches to his team:
“There are small little segments that you can step in and be a hero, but we should be helping our fellow man, not hindering him and filming him and being on a cell phone.”
“Small little segments” might not sound like a lot, but in a case like the one Blair faced, they can mean everything.
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