In practice, nobody can manage one’s own personal safety better (or at least routinely) than oneself, and governments rely on individuals to do so: the government cannot police everybody, it cannot choose our meals or our physical exercise, although it can advise us on safer living.
Is there a legitimate role for organizations that form to ensure security for a particular group or population? Would that give you special concerns?
We already organize privately to increase our collective security, as simple as asking a friend to escort you home through an unfamiliar area. Employers also organize privately when they acquire guards or locks or other access controls, for the collective safety of employees. Similarly, places of worship and neighborhoods sometimes organize the security of their residents.
In the end, if the police or other official forces are not available or able to control a sudden public risk, then private citizens should organize — this prescription is suggested by the official advice to run, hide, or fight in response to an active shooter.
The trouble arises when such organizations are selfish or divisive. For instance, during the riots in Britain in August 2011, which affected almost every British city over a week, some places of worship and neighborhoods organized vigilantes to defend homes and shops. Some were defensive, but all were inevitably ethnically or religiously defined, and appeared divisive, even if they did not intend to be divisive.
Of the five deaths attributed to the riots, in every case the victim and perpetrator were of different ethnicities, and the private responses contributed to further self-segregation in the largest and most diverse city in Europe.
How much can personal safety benefit from new smart technology, security cameras or social media?
Security expert Bruce Newsome notes that evidence suggests that most crimes, being of more routine and spontaneous natures, are not deterred even by public security cameras. (iStock illustration.)
These technologies are most useful in communicating with first responders, after one has already suffered a negative event, such as an accident or a crime, when one needs to communicate one’s location, or to get advice.
Evidence recorded on such technologies is most useful in the investigative stage, after crime. In other words, these technologies are not remarkably useful in preventing events.
In theory, they should deter crime, because they increase the chance that the criminal will be caught, but unfortunately evidence suggests that most crimes, being of more routine and spontaneous natures, are not deterred even by public security cameras, which can be defeated easily by a hoodie, say.
How safe do you feel, personally on a daily basis?
My personal safety, like anybody’s personal safety, is likely to be irrelevant to your personal safety, unless we share extremely similar activities, foods, residences, travel schedules and everything else that contributes to one person’s risks.
What I can say about my personal safety is that I feel in control of my personal risks, which is about all one can expect, because I am fortunate enough to feel informed about risks, and about how to control them, which are skills and knowledge that I try to impart to students.
Where I lose control of my risks is whenever I enter a public space, where somebody acts as a hazard to me, or takes away my control, say by cutting off my car while I am driving on a public road, or by approaching me on the sidewalk with intent to rob me, or worse.
Eliminating these essentially social risks is impossible, and we need to be trusting of one another to make any sort of social life possible, when almost all economic, educational and recreational activities are essentially social.
The basic rule remains one of exposure: If you expose yourself to a hazard, you are at risk; if you don't like a risk, try to reduce your exposure. At the same time, every one of us needs to navigate our own desires to participate economically, educationally or recreationally, while reducing our exposure.
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