How is your home defended?

[achilles]

I only read the first two posts, so I apologize if I'm beating a dead horse at this time, but...

Crime is actually been on the decline since around the mid 90's. Check the FBI's unified crime report or the NCVS and you will see that both show a downward trend as far as violent crime is concerned. Why this is is anybody's guess, but the aging of babyboomers out of the high-crime risk age range, the legalization of abortion and the stabilization of the crack market have all been correlated with the decline of violent crime rate. It seems that America is actually more safe now than, say, 15 years ago. Of course this is on an aggregate level and individual experience varies, but overall things aren't so bad.

 

[Andrew Green]

Fear of crime however, has gone way up...

 

[Black Bear]

Achilles, IIRC there was a sharp drop in crime in the early-mid 90's. It's still low, but not necessarily going down. Indeed it corresponded with about 18 years after the liberalization of abortion laws. I'm not a pro-abortion guy, but... eh....

Andrew Green is right though, fear of crime remains high. I think martial artists should do all we can to breed irrational paranoia in our society--it's good for business! :lol:

I like MACaver's post. It is correct that most BnE's occur in the daytime, when people are out at work and school, and that someone who enters a home knowing that it is occupied is a very dangerous person with bad intentions. If they take your stereo, that's one thing. If they come in at night when you're there, well, that's a concern.

Deadbolts (and other things having to do with a secure perimeter) do most of the work.

The most important thing to have on hand is flashlights. I favour a tough plastic clustered-LED. They are cheap and light on battery drain compared to Xenon bulbs like Surefire, that "hardcore self-defensers" are into.

I recently acquired 36" sjamboks from Cold Steel, and have been playing with them. I think they're fantastic. Good reach, super-fast, and you know, you can't accidentally overpenetrate and kill your 4-year-old with it. (This is not a knock against responsible gun owners, but they know better than I do that many of the folks who keep guns in their drawer are idiots who shot them at the range once, 5 years ago. Guns are fairly restricted and not commonly worn in my country, and we have to keep them under lock.)

If I have to move within the house to keep my family safe, I back these up with a clipit and cell phone on the waistband.