AFRAID OF ALL THE WRONG THINGS

[defrog]

ITEM: Parents concerned for their kids’ safety are more focused on rare and improbable dangers than actual threats, according to a new book.

Based on surveys Barnes collected, the top five worries of parents are, in order:

Kidnapping
School snipers
Terrorists
Dangerous strangers
Drugs

But how do children really get hurt or killed?

Car accidents
Homicide (usually committed by a person who knows the child, not a stranger)
Abuse
Suicide
Drowning

Why such a big discrepancy between worries and reality? Barnes says parents fixate on rare events because they internalize horrific stories they hear on the news or from a friend without stopping to think about the odds the same thing could happen to their children.

The same could be said for the US govt’s counter-terrorism strategies. Or the Tea Party. Or that dingbat in Florida. Or ...

Well you get the idea.

What’s really interesting is that this idea isn’t even new. Another book – The Culture of Fear: Why Americans Are Afraid of the Wrong Things – covered similar ground. It was published 11 years ago.

Somehow I don’t think we’ve progressed much since then.

Much ado about nothing,

This is dF

Comments

[thelastaerie.livejournal.com]

It's the same when people put guns at home to "defend" themselves from "intruders" but facts/statistics clearly show that there's a over 90% chance that household members would hurt themselves with that gun.

Or openly carry a gun to go to star bucks.