The Simple Best Thing You Can Do To Not Become A Victim

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The mother of a murdered girl said, “It’s easy for people to say she should have slept with pepper spray under her pillows or taken other security precautions, but people don’t do those things unless they’ve been victims.”   

It’s a fact that people don’t take regular security precautions unless they’re reminded or they’ve been victims of violent crime. Well, here’s a big reminder for us all. According to FBI stats, in America, one person is murdered every 31 minutes and one person is raped every 1.9 minutes. Now, if that’s not a reminder to take some regular sound security precautions, I’m not sure what is.  

Plain and simple truths

There are people who will hurt, kill and chew us up like burger meat if we allow them to. And what do I mean by ‘allow them to’? I mean giving criminals opportunities and little or no consequences. Let me elaborate. 

Opportunities

Not giving criminals opportunity means not going to bad areas, being aware before getting out or walking to our vehicles and it also means locking our house or apartment doors during the night AND during the day and utilizing outside lights or alarm systems.

Consequences

Consequences that criminals fear for their acts are simple. They don’t want to get caught and they don’t want to get hurt. So how do we utilize consequence against a bad guy?

  1. If possible, walk in a group or with a person going in your direction 
  2. Park in well-lit and busy areas
  3. Using regular or motion detection lights at our homes
  4. Alarm systems at our homes 
  5. Small barking dogs or larger dogs at home

Fear Of Being Hurt

When criminals see a sign like, ‘This is a firearm free zone’ or something similar, they laugh, breathe a sigh of relief and under their breath, probably, thank the dummy who initialed such a foolish rule that does nothing but perhaps scare law abiding people carrying a firearm who could help someone being attacked.

So how do we show a criminal the fear that we can hurt them?

  1. Walk as if you mean business—as if you will not be a pushover by any stretch off the imagination
  2. If attacked, pull your immediately ready at hand pepper spray or handgun and point it at the attacker as you simultaneously create distance from the criminal. Tell them to stop coming at you, in a strong and serious voice. If they continue to come at you, light them up like a Christmas tree as you still are backing away from the threat.

The most effective protection

The most effective security action we can take is the easiest and yet it’s the hardest. Being aware of your surroundings is the single best action we can utilize to not become a victim of violent crime. It’s easy to do but EVERYONE forgets to do it, regularly, unless they’ve been a victim of crime, or they know someone who has.

The simplest and best way I know to be reminded to be aware is by wearing the ‘5 to Survive’ reminder band on our wrist or putting it on our car’s rear-view mirror. What is this reminder band? 

5tosurvive.us

It’s a simple customized band that means for us to always take five seconds to look around before we go anywhere. It means to look to the left, right and the rear—to look all around us for anything that may bite.

It takes no more than five seconds and reminds us to do the action that is the most important one we can utilize to not be a victim.

I use it.  There’s no better way to be reminded.

Be aware. Be safe. You and your loved ones deserve it.

Steve Kovacs
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Steve Kovacs

About Steve Kovacs

Steve's the bestselling author of 'Protect Your Kids! The Simple Keys to Children's Safety and Survival'. He's written many articles on a wide variety of topics and has three published books. Steve's a three-time survivor of violence in his youth, a former police supervisor and a graduate of The Police Executive Leadership College (PELC) and was also an award winning part-time college Criminal Justice instructor. For several years, Steve did written and radio political and current event commentary and was the former host of the long running 'The Kovacs Perspective' Internet radio and TV talk show. Steve presently owns a small businesses in Ohio--The Mayfield Academy of Self-Defense.

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