Two Living, One Dead

This movie is infuriating! ... Gaaahh!!
Here's the setup:
One evening three men are closing up shop at the post office. One of them (Eric) is in the back room counting money and the other two (Anderson and John) are in the front doing who knows what because the camera is in the back room with the money-counter. Some noise comes from the front room and when Eric goes to see what the ruckus is about, he finds a robber pointing a gun at him. "Hey," says the robber, "give me that money you've been counting." So, like anybody who doesn't want to die, Eric hands over the money and, when the robbers leave, runs to get help for Anderson and John, who have both been injured. Anderson survives with a bonk on the head and John becomes the titular One Dead.
"Well," says everyone in town "Obviously Anderson's a hero for having a concussion and John's a hero for being dead. But Eric's a coward with no sense of loyalty so we have free reign to make his life hell."
Anderson is given praise, money and the promotion that was meant for Eric.
Eric is given a whole lot of mean things said about him. Also the kids at school treat his son like crap and his wife, who for about ten minutes was very happy Eric lived, decides she's with the townspeople and that promotion was more important than her husband's survival and turns into both a hysterical bitch and my least favorite character. (Seriously, if Eric won't shout at her, I will.)
In fact, the only people in town who still treat Eric like a human being are the wife of the guy who died and a man (Rogers) who lives in a boarding house with Anderson, who thinks Anderson is being a royally pompous ass about the whole "hero" thing.
Eric and Rogers become friends, giving each other advice for "friends of theirs," one of whom was the coward in the post office robbery, the other has a badly hurt brother in the hospital.
Two Living, One Dead actually becomes far less infuriating once Eric and Rogers start hanging out. The scenes between them are probably the best in the movie, and there's a scene where Rogers tells off Anderson for being a pompous ass that's very satisfying. (Although I think that happens before he meets Eric.)
In another scene Rogers kind of tells off Eric's wife for being a hysterical bitch, which was somewhat satisfying. (It would have been more satisfying if I could have climbed into the television and slapped her, but that technology doesn't exist yet.)
Overall it was a good movie in the sense that it was engaging and the main character is likeable, even if he is rather mousey and doormatly. It was just really hard to get through the first half when everybody is giving him shit for not getting himself shot.
'Cause here's the thing: I have always heard that proper protocol in a robbery is to do what the robbers say, especially if they're armed, and then get help afterwards. The reason for this is to avoid as much injury and death as possible. So why the hell is an entire town mad at this guy for doing things properly and for wanting to stay alive in order to provide for his family? "Oh you're not brave and stupid and dead, so you suck." No, he doesn't. He's smart.
Admittedly, if the robbers had messed with pretty much any other character Patrick McGoohan ever played they would've gotten punched in the face because fuck them, but he wasn't in that kind of movie. And, honestly, it was really cool to see him play someone rather mousey and doormatly.
It was just a hard movie to watch because I really, really didn't understand why everybody in town treated Eric the way they did.

End of line.
-Sally