DOES Dan Biederman have too high an opinion of mankind?
I thought about this the other day as I wandered into Bryant Park – the House that Dan Rebuilt – and noticed that volunteers were handing out popular books, magazines, newspapers, even seat cushions.
You may see these things as nice amenities in a beautiful park. I see them as part of a grand social experiment. The reading material and “tushions” (as the fanny-savers are called) are just the latest examples of the Bryant Park Restoration Corporation’s abiding faith in the people of New York.
This is the same quasi-private agency that has scattered 3,000 easy-to-steal chairs throughout the Midtown park. Yet Biederman, the corporation president, says that only four dozen are stolen a year.
OK, that’s furniture. Even the most larcenous New Yorker would feel awkward tucking a green folding chair under his arm. But People magazine or The New Yorker? They’re so easy to steal, you almost feel obligated to slip them into your bag.
Almost, but not quite. Biederman reports that in the first three months, the park has retained 85 percent of its books and magazines. And the three-week tushion experiment has been even more successful.
Diogenes, meet Dan Biederman.
“Our success with the honor system is all related to the broken-windows theory,” Biederman said. “We’ve eliminated visual clues that tell people they can behave badly. And we trust our fellow man.”
I wasn’t buying what Biederman was selling – it just seemed too optimistic, too Midwestern – so I called legendary forensic psychologist N.G. Berrill to see if there was a psychological basis for Biederman’s faith.
Berrill said he wasn’t surprised to hear that honesty had broken out in Bryant Park. “When you encourage trust, people respond favorably. It may sound counterintuitive in New York, but Freud said we have a subconscious respect for others called the superego.”
Apparently, this Freud guy said that when we’re kids, we actually absorb all the stuff our parents tell us, like “Respect people and they’ll respect you.”
“Clearly, the superego is alive and well and living in New York City,” Berrill concluded.
It would appear so. On the day I went to Bryant Park to check out the status of the honor system, people were enjoying all the park’s offerings – and returning them dutifully.
After watching this spectacle for a while, I noticed that Gulden’s Mustard was handing out sandwiches, slathered in their latest concoction. The sandwiches were free, one to a customer.
I ate one and when I was finished, I went over and took another, of course. I mean, someone had to violate the honor system. This is New York, after all!