Safety

Psychiatrists tell us that, of all the human needs, the need for safety is the greatest. It is the need that concerns us before worry about anything else. Without safety, they say, we can not be happy, fulfilled or content.

But safety is an unusual need in that it is based almost entirely upon an illusion. As humans, we are blessed (and cursed) with the knowledge that death is inevitable and that it could happen at any time. At best, safety is relative, at worst it is nonexistent and just a figment of our overactive imaginations.

The simple truth is that we are never safe. Freak accidents, diseases and any number of other deadly incidents can take place at any given time. Even if we lock ourselves away in a metal room and remove all foreseeable hazards, death and injury can find us. Deep down we know that.

If true safety were a requirement of our happiness, humans would be driven mad in frenzied attempts to mitigate every possible hazard, knowing that it is all a futile effort. As long as our mortality can not be escaped, safety can not be achieved.

Yet, most people, feel safe when they sleep at night. Though literally anything can happen while they slumber, they rest assured that they will wake up the next morning in much the same condition that they went to bed.

Our minds, over the years, have trained themselves to ignore the millions of risks we face, responding only to the most immediate and probable dangers we face. Much of this is self preservation, enabling us to spend our energy on the things that are most likely to hurt us, but much of it is also self deception, allowing us to turn a blind eye to less visible risks.

This has resulted in a warped sense of safety. The dangers we face every day have become skewed and warped by a combination of convenience, media hype and misinformation. Whether the dangers are bad drivers, terrorists, heart disease or bird flu, we know we can't possibly protect against all of the hazards we face, so we focus on the ones that make us feel the most safe, not necessarily the ones that pose the greatest risk.

That is the crux of the safety problem. Since safety is an illusion, so are many of the dangers. What makes us feel safe is often very different from what actually improves our chances of survival. What helps us sleep at night is rarely what helps us wake up in the morning.

This need for safety has become our Achilles heel. Our mortality has become our mortal weakness. We know neither safety nor happiness so long as we give in to illusions of safety and of danger. We are never as safe as we feel we need to be, nor are we in as grave of danger as we often think we are.

These notions, however, are lost on us as safety is a feeling and it knows no intellect. There is no rationalizing with the idea of safety or the people that feel they do not have it. Once lost, the quest for the feeling of safety is all-consuming, usually overpowering better forms of judgment and pushing us down paths we would never otherwise take.

The time has come to breathe. To realize that, while this need for safety that drives us is a positive thing, it is no being used to drive us down paths we need not tread. Safety has never been anything but an illusion and that lack of grounding is used against us every day of our lives by our governments, our media, our businesses and even others on the street.

The truth is that safety comes from within. You can not buy it, you can not vote for it and there is no knowledge that mysteriously grants it. Safety comes from within ourselves and our loved ones. It's about a place in your room that makes you feel safe, about being warm in the arms of a loved one, about finding the one thing that reminds you of safer times.

Safety is an illusion and it is a necessary one. However, we have to stop looking outside of ourselves to find it. Any illusion the world can give us can also be found within. If we make our own illusions, we can use them to our advantage. If we let others make our illusions, they can use them to their advantage.

It takes inner strength to do this, to look within for answers that do not exist, But that strength is what it truly takes to feel safe in such a crazy world.

Car Alarms

For the last three nights, Crystal and I have been woken up at odd hours in the morning, including once at four o'clock, by a 125 decibel montage of horns honking, sirens wailing and whistles blowing.

However, instead of being treated to an impromptu concert from a bad techno band, we're being startled awake by the car alarm on an late model Honda parked across the street.

This has lead to an inevitable conclusion. If you have and use an audible car alarm on your car or truck, you fit into one of three categories: Idiot, jackass or both.

Whether you think the car alarm is an effective theft deterrent or simply don't care that they are more annoying than a screaming baby in a quiet restaurant, you're out of touch with reality.

The Problem with Car Alarms

The biggest problem with car alarms is that they do nothing to reduce theft. A 1997 study by the insurance industry looked at the claims of over 73 million cars and found that the net effect of audible car alarms was zero.

The reason is two fold. First, no one connects a car alarm with a theft in progress. We're so used to alarms going off for no reason at tall that almost no one takes action when they hear an alarm. Generally, the only times the police are called are when the car alarm has been going on so long that residents wish it would be stolen, in the form of a police impound, or at least the owner be ticketed.

Second, professional thieves, who steal the bulk of cars, can disable an audible alarm in almost no time at all. Though it might be an obstacle to joyriders, the professionals simply do not care.

But this ineffective security comes at a very high price. Car alarms are the number one noise complaint in most cities, including New York, and can result in fines, impounding and other actions. In San Francisco, police are authorized to cut battery cables on a vehicle with a car alarm, New York has impounded some 7000 vehicles for excessive noise and the list of potential repercussions goes on.

The Human Side

Of course, these problems only account for issues faced by car owners. The pubic at large has even more issues to deal with.

Car alarms, and other loud noises, have been related to high blood pressure, stress, sleeplessness, breakdown in civility and countless other physiological and sociological ills.

Some studies have shown that prolonged loud noises can hinder concentration, learning and even reading ability in children. It can also make them less attentive in class and, in some cases, more prone to be disruptive.

To date, no study has found positive benefits to exposure to loud noises. The mind, body and community all suffers when subjected to ongoing high volumes of noise.

Alternatives

This is not to say that you can't take security precautions to protect your vehicle, just that you shouldn't use ineffective, noisy and annoying audible alarms. There are plenty of more effective and less annoying methods to protect your property.

  • Immobilizers: Immobilzers are products which prevent cars from being started without the proper key. They work by planting a microchip into the key and, without said chip in the ignition, the car will fail to start. This is dubbed the most effective anti-theft tool and is standard on all Ford and most GM vehicles.
  • Steering Wheel/Brake Locks: Though steering wheel locks, such as "The Club", can be somewhat easily beaten by professional thieves, others are more difficult and brake locks, which prevent a thief from depressing the brake and getting the vehicle out of park are considered very effective.
  • Silent Pages: Unlike audible alarms, which are easily disabled, do not attract attention and may not alert the owner effectively, silent pagers alert the owner without sounding an audible alarm, are less likely to be disabled and can actually help the owner respond in an effective way.

Conclusions

In the end, there is no reason to use an audible car alarm, let alone buy one. If you're looking into effective ways to protect your investment, save your money for something that does more than just annoy your neighbors.

It's time for the car alarm to be put to bed, so the rest of us can do the same.




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