Also, I know it is cold in parts of the country at some seasons of the year. I grew up just outside of Chicago, and I worked downtown taking the trains in the Windy City. You want cold? Stand on an El platform 25 feet in the air in Chicago when the wind is howling in off the lake in February. Even so... Do not start your car and leave it running to warm it up. DO. NOT.
This is an examination of what happens when you try to stop someone from stealing your car, and all of the ways things can go wrong.
This is the Active Self Protection video Family Tries To Stop Car Thief But It Gets Very Dangerous!
In this case there was no gunfight, and no one was hurt. People are always on about how they have the right to protect their property. Which is fine. John C. and I think that is bad risk management, but you do you.
You here someone "messing" with your car, so you decide to go out and "confront" them. You are going to get into a gunfight with an unknown number of people, probably more than one, of unknown skill and intent. You might prevail, and you might be injured or die. For what? The deductible on your car insurance? Legal fees relating to a shooting incident will be orders of magnitude higher than your deductible, and probably more than the value of your car.
Friend, If you can't afford full coverage insurance on your car, you cannot afford to get into a gunfight with a car thief. Okay?
The video is 14 minutes.
Here is a short look at what winter can be in Chicago.
"You might prevail, and you might be injured or die. For what?"
ReplyDeleteFor principle. For justice. For honor. For making the world just a little bit safer.
Used to be that was enough. I spent 21 years under oath to die in combat if ordered to do so. Spent a good chunk of that 21 years serving on "the most dangerous 5 acres in the world" and saw several friends and shipmates die or be seriously injured.
For what? We weren't at war. Bad risk management on our part?
Risk management is a personal calculation for each and every one of us. As you said, you do you...but I'd rather die standing up than live on my knees...or, as my father used to say: "everyone dies, what matters is how you lived".
There are things worth dying for. My 9-year-old SUV is not one of them, but you do you
DeleteI get that. But for me it wouldn't be about the SUV. I'll confront someone for throwing a candy wrapper in my lawn. Sure, it could be a gang banger that's going to start popping off at me for "disrespecting" him. Or it could be a kid that just needs a stern reminder that it's not the rest of the world's job to pick up after him. A civil society is a choice. If you're not willing to take risks to protect it, you won't have one.
DeleteI read stories like this all the time. Some even make it into the blog. It doesn't always work out.
DeleteIn one case a guy went out to "confront" the bad guys, they opened fire, striking his teenage daughter who was in the house. She didn't die, but that was only because cops carried tourniquets on them, and they arrived before she bled out.
And even if it is "only you" who dies, what happens to the people who depend on you, who love you?