Burglarised!

Right - on crime again.
So I FINALLY got burglarised again. First time in about 3 years. They took a laptop, a DVD player and left a knife on my bed.
And guess what?
I STILL don't want to have a guard in front of my house. I will STILL go out by myself. Ok - I'm more sensible about locking the door when I'm home, especially after dark, cause I sometimes used to forget that, but I still, even though I know I might have been raped or killed, believe that life is not meant to be lived in fear, and that if the criminals prevent me from living MY LIFE, then they have won.

So - the radio and the Chamber of Commerce are calling for a state of emergency (SOE). Limited, of course. Yeah right! So - the criminals lay low, bury their guns, hide out in the mangrove swamps of Venezuela. The SOE ends, with everyone beating their chests and saying - we've licked crime!

And... we'll be right back where we started. But worse, because we'd jump back into another SOE. And another. And then... continuous SOE = Military Rule = Lack of Civil Liberties = BAD BAD BAD.

I noticed this in the US after 9/11 - people rushed to give up their rights for the hope that they might feel safer. But I am convinced that no-one can be safe, even if giving up these rights gives us no crime and no terrorism, without our civil rights.

Our ancestors fought too long and too hard for them. They MUST be worth a lot. What did they know that we don't? Well - how about living without rights? Most of us who are rushing blindly to give the police more and more power have never lived in a police state, have never lived as slaves, have never lived without. And it's our responsibility to carefully consider what we are giving them up for - is it worth it? Because when we give them up - we may not get them back.

Thomas Jefferson said "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. " Are we ready to pay that price? Seems not.