They miss out on the joy of life.
To be alive is to expose yourself to risk. I could live a relatively safe life by killing myself slowly. That way you and I won't notice it so much when I die.
I can start by staying inside. Then I can control what I eat and drink and associate only with the safest people. I'll never drive fast, walk fast, run, jump, climb, drink, use a drug, smoke anything or eat anything smoked.
Not only will I wear a helmet when I ride my bike and fasten my seat belt in my car; I'll wear a helmet and fasten myself securely at all times. I'll just sit still and eat oatmeal. While I'm at it I'll move underground so I'll be safer in the event of some threat at ground level. Now that I'm underground and almost dead...
A little understanding of probability would go a long way to allaying people's fears. Afraid that you might get a disease from the public blood supply? Be a victim of a violent crime? Be attacked by a grizzly bear or a shark?
It all depends on the degree of risk you are willing to assume.
Here's a way to think about your chance of getting HIV from a blood transfusion -
Write the numbers 1 through 500,000 on individual pieces of paper. Throw them up in the air and spread them around the room. Think of a number between 1 and 500,000. Pick up a piece of paper with a number on it. If it's the number you thought of you are one lucky/unlucky son of a gun.
Your chances of getting HIV/AIDS from a unit (one pint) of blood are about 1 in 500,000. To be fair, the risks of contracting HIV, hepatitis C, hepatitis B or HTLV-1 from a blood transfusion is about one in 34,000 transfused units. You can write down numbers from 1 to 34,000 and repeat the experiment. You should try picking your number 3 or 4 times to simulate a transfusion of 3 or 4 pints of blood.
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Being a victim of a violent crime is much more likely than getting sick from a blood transfusion. For a woman the chances of rape are about 34 times as likely since there are about 1 reported rape per 1000 people in the U.S. in the 1990's.
In any given year, until the 1990's, about 50 people in 1000 were victims of some sort of violent crime including rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault. This is an interesting rate since it seems if we live 20 years we will all be victims of some sort of violent crime. Either that or some people are victims multiple times.
Not to blow this out of proportion but it's important to understand risk if you want to control it or keep it at a level you are comfortable with.
It's easy to see why being alone in dangerous areas, drinking or otherwise making yourself less able to recognize dangerous situations, putting yourself in the path of danger without controlling the risks is not smart. On a side note - it may not be so obvious but recognizing that road (or other) rage is something to stay away from. I'm guessing a fair number of those simple and aggravated assaults could have been avoided if one party would have opted out before it was too late.
Here's the good news on violent crime.
It isn't increasing.
This is really hard to fathom considering the concentration the mass media has on sensational crime reporting.
This graph is interesting because it shows how constant crime rates were. Unfortunately it's out of date. The interesting thing is crime rates have shown a sharp decline since this graph was created. In 2001 the violent crime rate was about 25 per 1000.
Interesting to think about why that might be. Some claim it's the tougher sentencing laws that result in higher incarceration rates and also a disincentive to people who "think" about the legal consequences before they assault someone. Other people say it's because the crack cocaine epidemic played out with the younger generation who watched mothers, fathers, neighborhoods, destroyed by crack cocaine; making the decision to stay away from crack. This paper prepared for the California Attorney General, sums up the questions about why there was a sharp decrease in crime in the late 90's.
One of the questions of course is what effect meta-amphetamine use will have on crime rates. On a side note - Meta-amphetamines or Methamphetamine has a long history. It was used/abused by the Japanese immediately after World War II, by the Nazis and U.S. forces during the war. It was commonly prescribed in the U.S. in the 1950's as a weight loss or "pep" pill. I think the point of that is that if a person could control their use of this highly addictive drug they wouldn't necessarily be on the road to hell...unfortunately that doesn't work a lot of the time. I'm not a big fan of DARE scare tactics but these pictures of the effects of meth on a woman over a 4 year period and of an addicts arm from the DEA are instructive.
Sources: Methamphetamine - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
BJS Technical Report - Displaying Violent Crime Trends
USATODAY.com - Violent crime rate in America continues steep decline
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I won't go into the risk of being eaten by a grizzly or a shark.
I will say after the movie "Jaws" came out in the 70's I felt a bit of fear in pools or lakes. Totally irrational of course, but the point is we can get really scared about whatever we decide to focus our attention on.
Saturday Night Live took off on the national fear that Jaws started with the "Land Shark" skit which featured a shark who knocked on the door and said "candygram", then ate the people who answered the door. You would have to see it to get the humor. There's a video about the skit at 101 Most Unforgettable "SNL" Moments - Video Gallery.
It helps me to step back from the nightly news, T.V. talk shows, crime shows, T.V. in general, newspapers, scarey/violent movies and other media focused on the sensational and read and concentrate on some good stuff, some fun things, things to laugh about, beautiful things, check out what's going on outside my door in the real world.
Lot's of sunshine out there today. No sharks or grizzlies around..
I better get out and enjoy the day.
