Are "Good Samaritans" Doing More Harm When They Call Out a Mom's Behavior?

You're walking through the parking lot on your way into the grocery store when you see something strange in a car. There's a cracked window and a toddler sitting inside napping. No one else is around. What do you do? Do you assume the kid is fine and that his mom is probably returning any minute now? Do you wait to make sure? Do you write down the license plate number before calling the police?

Many "good samaritans" have gone through that very mental checklist when faced with such a situation, but for a select few moms on the receiving end, the result feels more like provocation — the derailment of a quick errand and an attempt to keep a sleeping baby happy into a legal nightmare in which an otherwise overprotective mother is charged with child endangerment.

One such mother, Kim Brooks, writes in Salon about this new form of moral vigilantism:

Lately, I've become as interested in these people who call the police on women like myself as I am in the victims of this new type of harassment. And when I think about them, it's not indignation I feel but sadness and regret at how little any of us know about each other's lives. I see these good samaritans slowing down in a parking lot, resisting the anonymity of modern life, wanting to help but unsure of what to do, of how to reach out or engage. I see them grappling with this uncertainty for the briefest moment, then reaching for the phone. We're raising our kids in a moment when it's easier to call 911 than to have a conversation.

In her essay, titled "What a Horrible Mother," she went on to reference the new genre of YouTube entertainment where strangers take out their phones to record children's temper tantrums in the checkout line instead of offering to help parents who might have their hands full.

She even recounted a situation when she was faced with the desire to play good samaritan herself after witnessing a "deeply upsetting" altercation between a father and his child. But instead of intervening, she resisted.

I made a split-second decision that the cost of doing anything would be too high. The solitude of raising kids outside of strong communities can be crushing; and left to ourselves, we all become worse parents than we hoped to be.

In the end, her piece obliges us to ask some tough questions. Is there a difference between a child trapped in a hot car as the result of a negligent parent and a toddler happily waiting for his mother to run a five-minute errand? Is it even a bystander's responsibility to determine such difference? In today's world, for would-be good samaritans, is it too great a risk to do nothing or too strong an indictment to do anything? When we see something that isn't quite right and our gut moves us to take action, are we doing more harm than good?

How would you draw the line?