Would you really help out a STRANGER Jump Start / Change Flat Tire / Buy Gas ?

Most likely . Saturday night had to turn around and park the car on the side of the state road ( flashers on ) to remove a large branch and pieces of it out of the path of drivers . I did have to go into other lane to avoid it . Watched as others did the same in the rear view mirror and those in passing vehicles that wouldn't stop . Couldn't live with thought of someone swerving to avoid it and going into oncoming traffic or off the side of the road . Also , was large enough to damage someone's vehicle . We think it fell off a truck bed . No trees near enough to drop from .
 
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I have before. I can't say I'll help everytime, but if there appears to be little or no danger to me and my family, I'll help.
 
Yes with services - jump start, tire change, etc.

But not with "can I have a few bucks to put gas in my tank".

If you got this far, you should have considered how you were going to pay to get where you're going.
I usually say meet me at such and such gas station and I'll put gas in your car.

Those who really need it will usually follow.

Those that are looking to put together money to feed an addiction don't really want gas money, and therefore, don't really want gas.

I will buy a meal, clothes, car parts or fill a tank, but I won't hand out cash.
 
I will help a stranger but like most of you, I assess the situation. I didnt always carry jumper cables and have been on the receiving end of needing my battery jumped off. I keep a set of cables along with a 12 volt tire inflator in all my vehicles but I learned the hard way and others may do the same.
 
Back in 1989 picked up a somewhat sketchy guy for ride(hailed me) next to a broken down Alpha Romeo Convertible in Western Maine in rural area near NH border one evening. Pretty much low traffic state route.

Turned out to be Stephen King, what a nice guy.
 
Back in 1989 picked up a somewhat sketchy guy for ride(hailed me) next to a broken down Alpha Romeo Convertible in Western Maine in rural area near NH border one evening. Pretty much low traffic state route.

Turned out to be Stephen King, what a nice guy.

Well at least it wasn't the guy pushing 7 minute abs.

 
Back in 1989 picked up a somewhat sketchy guy for ride(hailed me) next to a broken down Alpha Romeo Convertible in Western Maine in rural area near NH border one evening. Pretty much low traffic state route.

Turned out to be Stephen King, what a nice guy.

That's awesome!

I would add.. if the stranger looks like they are trying to score money for drugs, no. If they didn't? Probably.

It is the sociopaths, that lie so effortlessly they seem believable and credible that you have to worry about. They will get you.
 
People ask me "Hey, can you help me out?" I usually say.. "Coins aren't going to help you."

People say.. "Hey, I need like 5 bucks".
I say .. "Yeah, I do too."

People waking in a line of cars, fresh clothes and sneakers, Vietnam vet sign,looks like they are 25 years old. Usuly get handed a crisp $20 bill if it's that part of town. They come up to my car, "I just watched you get $20" or "You just got $20..."

Grifting is REAL!
 
For people who actually need help, and assessing the situation, I have no problem helping with a jump, a push, or help with a tire. I've done two jumps just this year. If the situation isn't right, I'll help get someone who can help and that's it...

And I summarize it one word: Karma.
 
As a lifetime 4WD owner … most I have helped were stuck and I pulled them out.
Have also plugged tires and jump started a few …
Really have to size up the risk these days …
 
For people who actually need help, and assessing the situation, I have no problem helping with a jump, a push, or help with a tire. I've done two jumps just this year. If the situation isn't right, I'll help get someone who can help and that's it...

And I summarize it one word: Karma.

I think Karma is a type of religion. I'm more into quantum entangle and bell's inequality which basically says there's no hidden variables and the universe is inherently random. Although I think Bell said that it might mean the universe is deterministic although that would mean picking one of several interpretations to account for the randomness. I mean there's still no real solution to Schrodinger's cat.
 
I was in Miami not too far from the airport and I saw a guy on the side of the road with his hood up, hazard lights on and waving his arms trying to get me to pull over.

It was around 11 PM and I was NOT going to stop to see what he needed. This was around 25 years ago when there was a rash of German tourists being targeted by ‘bump and rob’ thugs.

Back then rental cars could be easily identified by their license plate, the state had to change it to reduce tourists being followed from the airport on their way to Miami Beach and bumped from behind and very easy targets.
 
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I’ve helped many people. I helped a military mechanic who had come home after being discharged in the Walmart parking lot last Christmas she didn’t have a clue how to fix a car she even told me that lol she was trying to pour oil in through the dipstick so I helped her and then put the fuel additive she had bought in her tank for her and checked her air filter I just happened to have my fully stocked truck with me and her car was majorly bogging down she said. I also have jump started many people too.
 
I'll still help almost anyone if they ask, the only thing I'm really cautious about now is gas or gas money, and also lending my phone to anyone. I remember one time a guy asked for $20 for his Dodge Durango for gas to get to some city not that far and I had no cash on me, told him as such, and I told him I'd pump him $10. My bank account was double digits at the time and I wasn't doing spectacular for money either. I did it, and he was pretty ungrateful and kinda pissed at me. Since then I've not helped anyone else with gas. If I'm driving or walking somewhere and it's not too inconvenient and I have cash I'll give a few $1s to a homeless dude, I've had some just say "Hey I need $2 for a beer" and I kinda prefer that honesty. One person with gas about 5 years ago in a parking lot I felt bad about, as he seemed legitimate and I could have helped him. Told me he had a job at ____ and his car ran out of gas on the highway, and he offered to pay me back if I helped. I could have helped him, but it would have required me taking him in my car to my house to get gas cans, and driving him to his car, he didn't really seem dangerous, it just would have taken an hour or two out of my day and I just felt more calloused about helping people at that time, and it happened after ungrateful possible scammer. I still feel kind of bad about it for some reason.

For phones, another time I've been burned by a woman asking to borrow my phone at a hotel in Florida, and then later I saw her on a phone on her balcony. I get a call from some gangster sounding dudes, and I saw her go into a car with them later. Turns out she just borrowed phones to call her drug dealers in case one side or the other was wiretapped.

One thing I'm big on trying to help is giving people pushes, especially if they're in a dangerous location at a stop sign or something creating a traffic jam. I view it more like I'm helping everyone around me avoid an accident or traffic blockage. I try to always push them to somewhere safer where they're not blocking traffic. One person I helped in a fairly busy city intersection had nobody stop to help him for an hour and a half stuck at a light, even the police did absolutely nothing to help, and there was a gas station on a right at the light where I pushed him to for safety (it was a 90s Honda Accord, pretty light, and the owner got out and helped, too.)

With karma and all that, it's also the golden rule of do unto others. I can't say by any means I'm some sort of great upstanding extremely moral person, but I've been helped with jumps, I've been helped by pushing my car before, helped in all sorts of ways by complete strangers over the years. So I feel it's important to pay it forward if I can.
 
I once stopped for an old woman whos car had stalled. Then a local police officer also stopped. The woman said she lived a couple of miles away, and I asked the police officer if he could give her a ride home. He said he is not allowed to do that. So I took out my drivers license and showed the woman that I was showing it to the police officer so he would know who she was getting a ride from. I took her to her home and parked across the street from her house and waited in the car while she went inside and phoned some people and also phoned the local garage. She said that she needed to go to the local garage and the mechanic would take care of her and her car, so I took her there and left her there. During the ride I told her that I was actually driving my dads car, and mine was getting an entire paint job, and that I had to go and pick up my dad at his Boy-Scout troops fish fry where they raise money for the kids in the troop to go on a trip each summer. She told me that she is active in the troop in her area.

One time I was in an area where the road lead onto a sections where you had to select which of several large highways you were going to get onto. The car in front of me had a very low back tire. It was obvious that they driver did not have a clue about the very low tire and was driving at the normal speed. And it was also obvious that the the car was going to get on one of the much faster highways ahead. I started flashing my lights and blowing my horn in three beeps in a row, the signal for some type of problem. But in order to stay behind the car for long enough to convince it it had a problem I had to follow it onto a long circular section that only led to entrances to several highways ahead that all went in directions that did not go where I wanted to go. But I did get the car to stop, and a young woman got out and I told her she had a tire going flat and she could not go at any fast speed with a tire like that. She said she would get it taken care of at a place ahead, and drove off slowly. I then had to get onto a highway that went in the wrong direction for me and travel a decent long distance before I could turn around and get back to the direction I was initially going.
 
This lady I estimate was inside her freezing car for well over 30 minutes, Just sometimes a bit surprised that the vast majority chooses to ignore the signs for help.
Chivalry is dead. And women killed it.

I'd elaborate on that, but I wouldn't want to be accused of toxicity and mansplaining.

Though that's not the main reason why culture has degraded and fewer people are willing to help others.
 
I always help if I can.
I will say that people should be responsible as well. I purchased a 3 yr. Good Sam roadside assistance membership for $99 that covers me in any vehicle I am in
regardless if I own it or not.
 
Last Saturday at midnight going through a Mcdonald's drive through
a lady asked if I could give her a ride as she just lived down the road. She wouldn't even let me order my food.

Just down the road was 22 miles away. Said she had a husband but he refused to pick her up. I really don't like helping in this way unless I know you. She wasn't very grateful either.
 
On a hot day this summer … there was a guy parked near me at a lumber yard in an old Tundra. I recognized him as a popular guy back in school … Married a hot rich girl … they stayed tan with many trips to Cancun … He still dressed like Jimmy Buffett - interesting because they ran cattle …

I had a look … battery was older than dirt and covered with same … corrosion on terminations … cleaned that up … Nothing. Hook up cables. Started my truck and let it idle … nothing … While he’s on the phone, a glance inside and truck left in “D” … Starts now … I’m gone.
Tell my wife later (in the small town gossip circle) … said he’s powder sniffer - Well, he seemed like it too …
 
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