Crime and the holidays: Let us not live in fear

It was late and I was heading home. At first I thought about taking a bus. Then I thought about how unsafe buses were; all manner of thievery, Zesto gangs (I mean, really, those guys are still doing this?), and the way that bus drivers drive which makes you feel like you’re always on the verge of a collision.

 

They clarify in the film “Hot Fuzz” that car accidents imply that no one was at fault because they were accidents and couldn’t have been avoided. So the appropriate terminology is traffic collision, because that allows for accidents, as well as incidents where people are reckless and at fault. And yeah we’ve got a heck of a lot of collisions.

 

Another option was taking a taxi. Which I normally do. But as the holidays come into full swing, taking a taxi becomes more frightening too. Apart from our regular problem of getting cabs to take us where we want them to (the negotiation process and the demand for extra pay is so frustrating), the possibility of meters that run too fast, and the horror stories of cab drivers taking advantage of their female passengers, we now have to contend with the possibility that these taxis are stolen and there are bad dudes in the trunk in cahoots with the driver. They will take you to an ATM and then take all your Christmas money.

 

But we live with this fear. This is something that is part and parcel of our daily lives. We worry about our bags getting slashed, our pockets getting picked, people threatening us with knives for our phones and wallets, and sometimes even just the random encounters that can lead to violence. Because you never know the kind of crazy that you’ll run into on the street.

 

People who drive have their own set of fears. Hear about that little girl who got shot because of a traffic altercation? Wild fire ricocheted at her vehicle and hit her. And while I remember being afraid of random street violence, friends from the upper crust had to be afraid of being kidnapped and held for ransom.

   

People are shot getting off a plane. Then again I had a friend whose girlfriend was shot and killed in front of her house because of a business rivalry. A close friend of mine was taken, missing for a week, and found murdered and burned. While the perpetrators were caught, the masterminds are still at large.

 

Oh and if you’re riding your bike there’s a chance you can get crushed by a bus. Journalists are killed on a regular basis. People die from violent crime, public transportation accidents, etc etc etc.

 

So why this laundry list of downers?

 

To show how we have become so used to living in this kind of society. We are only shocked by these events for as long as the news cycle lasts. Then another tragedy happens and we say, “Grabe ano?” and then we keep going. “Ganyan talaga sa Pilipinas.”

 

It’s time we said, no, this isn’t how it should be. And there should be concrete steps taken to address this issue of security, this issue of having to live in fear. I know that living in itself has inherent risks, that every time we step out the door we run all kinds of possible risks. But I am unwilling to accept how much danger exists in our society, as a matter of, well, it’s just how things are.

 

A large step must be taken by the government to address the safety and security situation that we are currently dealing with. It’s not just about putting boots on the ground. And it isn’t just about the president and vice-president visiting a mall after a bunch of robbers wielding hammers and crowbars perpetrate a brazen robbery.

 

The first step is to acknowledge how serious this problem is. The current administration has been flippant in dismissing concerns. During the post-typhoon disaster operations, they kept maintaining that things couldn’t have been that bad. When the body count for journalists was released, they said it wasn’t so serious. Let’s stop living in this state of denial.

 

The first step towards change is acceptance. Let’s accept that we have a serious, deep-rooted problem. Let’s acknowledge that there is a lot that is wrong, from the personal levels, to the systemic.

 

We live in a country where systems encourage reckless driving. We also live in a system that discourages honest journalism. We live in a system where violent crime and tragedy are part of the national consciousness. Just because we are used to it doesn’t mean that it’s right. And just because we’re used to it doesn’t mean we should learn to live with it. — KDM, GMA News