Yes! Yes! Yes!

[zola]

I have been saying this for literally YEARS. People are afraid, and where there's fear, to quote Starhawk, there's power.

Must, MUST read.

Maybe I'll do an entry on how to realistically calculate risk later.

Comments

Don't forget about politics

[johnhummel.livejournal.com]

There's a great documentary from the BBC titled "The Power of Nightmares" - basically it goes into the last 6-7 years and the "war on terror", and how fear is being used for political gain rather than promises of real progress.

Re: Don't forget about politics

[zola.livejournal.com]

I think what bugs me is that the paranoia keeps us blind to the actual threats. I don't remember if I posted it or not, but homeland security money went to I think it was a petting zoo in the midwest... couldn't that money have been better spent?

[tifaria.livejournal.com]

I watched that the other night on 20/20, and I have to agree. I mean, I've noticed myself getting more and more paranoid the older I get, especially when it seems like every time I turn around some college girl has mysteriously gone missing and turns up dead. Obviously it's not that it happens a lot, it's just that the media reports it a lot, but still.

[zola.livejournal.com]

Well, how many college age girls do you know personally who have disappeared and turned up dead?

Doing an informal survey can be an eye-opener. Take murder in general. How many people do you personally know who have been murdered? how about friends of a friend?

I know more people who have been killed in motorcycle accidents than have been murdered, and I can still count that number on the fingers of one hand.

If you talk to others and you're coming up with similar figures for them, then you get a much better idea of relative risk, if you follow.

[tifaria.livejournal.com]

I actually do (or did, I suppose) know someone who disappeared and was murdered when she was in high school. Another girl disappeared around the same time as her and I had friends who knew her, although I didn't. She's never been found.

I've known two people who commited suicide, and at least a few friends who have either had relatives die or friends die in accidents or murders. It's probably less than ten altogether, but around here, it seems like a lot. The murder rate in this town, while high for a town its size, is still much lower than elsewhere in the country. It seems, though, that it's gone steadily up over the last few years. Just this last weekend three people were murdered in as many days, which around here is a lot.

I don't actually believe that I'm at high risk of being killed and/or going missing, but there are times that I am very afraid, especially coming home from work at night and or walking to my car at school at night. I do my best to be safe and not worry, but it's hard sometimes.

[zola.livejournal.com]

I do understand. What I'm saying here is out of all the people you know, you personally knew one person. You personally know more people who killed themselves than you know people who were abducted and murdered. If you ask around and are getting roughly the same kinds of answers (and ask all kinds of people, not just people close by), then you would have the idea that probably the risk of suicide is greater than the risk of disappearing and being murdered, and I think that's actually closer to the truth, although I'd have to check statistics to be sure.

I think that human beings are wired to play the odds, it makes sense when you think about it--do I try for food here or there? Do I set up camp in this cave or would the wooded area offer more protection?

The thing is, we need accurate information in order to get a clear picture, and the news isn't really giving us accurate information in the sense of how often it happens.

When we're scared, we're actually less capable of responding to our environment, and that, to me, is the problem. If you're scared, for instance, when you're coming home from work at night, you may be hypervigilant as you walk out to the car and yet not pay attention to that dude at the bar since you're around other people, if you see what I mean. But you've probably got a much better chance of being drugged at a bar than you do of being murdered walking out to your car.

But the biggest issue of all, to me, is that I see people limit themselves because they are afraid, and the thing that's really messed up is that it doesn't seem to do crap other than to make their world more limited.

I think in some ways we get sold this bill of goods that if we are only conservative and careful enough, bad things won't happen to us. And it's simply not true. I could stay here in my house and hide under the computer desk, and there's still no guarantee that something won't happen--maybe there will be a landslide that buries that corner of the house, or lightning will strike and the house will burn down.

So when I weigh out relative risk, personally, I keep that in mind. There's steps you can take to reduce risk, but everything carries a risk, even crossing the street. There are no guarantees. And if I died tomorrow, I lived a very full, very rich life, and for me, at least, that's more valuable than living under my desk until the ripe old age of 102, you know?

[tifaria.livejournal.com]

Yes, I definitely agree with you. My mother and I argue about this sometimes because she's even more paranoid than I am and constantly worries every time I leave the house. It's funny, because I've often told her before almost exactly what you just said, yet I find that I actually do worry a lot about these kinds of things when given time to think about it. The media thrives on sensationalizing crime, and I'm a sucker for watching these things unfold on television, but it's true that it's not an accurate depiction of what's going on.

Anyway, my point was, I agree with you, yet I'm one of those people who buys into this fear stuff, even while telling myself that it's a bunch of crap.