Some thoughts about ”Toget som (ikke) gikk”. (The train that (never) left.)

In January last year (in Oslo) a man was brutally beaten up outside -and later on the same bus with 39 witnesses present. No-one tried to prevent the abuse and no one called the police. It was the passivity of the witnesses that shocked me and not the abuse alone. I started to do research on the topic and I found out that there are numerous examples like the one on the bus. There is a psychological theory that is called the bystander effect. It deals with the fact that in many cases the individual is less likely to act in a disturbing situation if he/she is with a group of people.
My intention was to create confusion and focus on the passiveness. Particularly the first 3 scenes are supposed to be in ”safe” enviroments. The characters are good-doers and one would think that they have a stronger sence of wanting to help than other people. But still there’s something going on that they can’t relate to. And the people around the main characters are unable to help them, for whatever reasons. This creates a drama and a feeling of helplessness. The symbolic value of witnesses is also important.