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from the If-you-are-reading-this-message... dept.
Natalie Matthews writes that a year ago, a friend of hers left her two roommates at a bar to walk the three blocks home to their apartment in a yuppie Boston neighborhood. "She wanted decent sleep before a Saturday morning exercise class; her friends wanted late night food. Instead, she was jumped by a stranger on the curb of her apartment building, brutally raped, and beaten in her living room while her roommates ate burritos, none the wiser," writes Matthews. " If she'd done something, anything, differently, would it have changed the outcome of her night? It's an unproductive exercise, both she and I know. And yet when I heard about Kitestring, she was the first thought that flashed in my mind, because maybe Kitestring would have helped her, had it existed then."
Kitestring is a new service that aims to make sure people get from point A to point B safely, notifying their emergency contacts if they don't. You tell Kitestring that you're in a dangerous place or situation, and give it a time frame of when to check in on you. If you don't reply back when it checks your status, it'll alert your emergency contacts with a custom message you set up. "Perfect for blind or online meet-up dates, walking home at night, or feeling safe in any dangerous situation, Kitestring is like the virtual mom I've always needed," writes Mary Rockcastle, "especially if your mom is like mine and is never awake past 8:30pm."
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bradley13 on Monday April 28 2014, @10:59AM
I like your comment right up to the last paragraph: "politicians are not willing to implement death sentence...violent crimes are plentiful because the criminals are not afraid." Criminals are not going to be any more afraid, even if you give jaywalking a death sentence. Criminals don't expect to get caught.
The answer isn't tough laws - the laws are already tough, and there are too many of them. "Three felonies a day", and that's law-abiding citizens. Prosecutors in the USA already have more than enough "pile on" crimes to put anyone they want in jail for as along as they want.
Your answer of self-defense is the right one: everyone should know some basics of self-defense, and should be prepared to use it. A gun, for people who want to go that way, otherwise martial arts or whatever. Heck, just run away screaming. It doesn't matter, because it's about mentality, about *not* doing what the criminal wants.
This is particularly important for women. I remember being taught: if someone demands your money, just give it to them. I now think that this is wrong. If you say "yes" once, you'll say it again: "Give me your purse", "come quietly", "go in here", "shut up and I won't hurt you". Don't even start down the path of cooperation...
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2, Informative) by dcollins on Monday April 28 2014, @07:36PM
Re: Non-cooperation, the bright line drawn in the defense class that I went to was: stuff yes, people no. Give them your money or car or whatever, but when they want you to go with them to another location all hell breaks loose. To me that seems like a pretty memorable distinction.