Originally Posted by
acidfast7
Common sense is usually in order.
Why ride in a "bad part of town" at night?
Why live where you have to ride through a "bad part of town at all?"
Why live in area that has "bad parts of towns?"
Why live in countries that have such large wealth disparities?
Why not live somewhere where violence is reduced because the wealth is more evenly distributed?
If one can't move, why not change one's lifestyle such that one could move?
IMHO, carrying a weapon isn't the answer unless you're asking the wrong, usually short-term, short-sighted questions.
I love this whole line of thinking... I once worked on a Navy base which happened to be on the other side of "a bad part of town." That "bad part of town" was a wide strip that ran from the ocean all the way east some 7 miles or so... and the Navy base was right on one edge of "the bad part of town." To avoid that area would have meant perhaps a 10-14 mile detour ultimately to come right back to the edge of it at the base. Navy bases tend to draw a certain element that can make them part of "the bad part of town." Rather hard then to avoid "the bad part of town."
Huge swaths of Long Beach are likewise industrial areas that are not exactly havens for the best folks around... you might live in a nice residential area and work in a nice business park area but find that there is a less than suitable area in between. Folks traveling on Freeways may have no idea other that the not so pretty landscape... but on a bike you tend to have real close contact with where ever you are.
Oh and I love these questions...
Why not live somewhere where violence is reduced because the wealth is more evenly distributed?
If one can't move, why not change one's lifestyle such that one could move?
Have you noticed that the current economy is not exactly conducive to upward mobility? Or that to "move upward" might take the better part of several years of college? We don't all start out as doctors and lawyers. (although some may consider lawyers to be part of the "bad part of town..."
)