HINT: A snake's belly.
The point is that people can be made to fear things and exaggerate the risks based on isolated, anecdotal incidents that get a lot of attention. Every so often, the media will have their own version of "shark week" when they highlight the attacks by sharks on swimmers and surfers. The thought of being eaten by a shark is pretty horrifying, and, if the media reports that "there has been an upsurge in attacks recently" -- either because it had been winter and now it's summer, or because last year there were five and this year there have been seven -- the audience tends to picture shark fins in the municipal swimming pool.
The same is true of serial killers, child abductions, tornadoes, or terror attacks. Similarly, if something gets glossed over and not emphasized -- auto accidents involving teenagers, for example -- it drops from the attention of the masses. Those who die or are severely injured from some unusual cause are just as damaged as from something more common. Each incident is a heart-rending tragedy for the individuals involved. We are right to feel bad for the victims and do what we can to help. But the risks for 99% of us remain very low, and we should not allow ourselves to be frightened into shredding the Constitution and hiding under the couch.
In my lifetime, I have been threatened by communism, anti-communism, Elvis, butter, marijuana, LSD, heroin, hippies, the Beatles, the Klan, the Black Panthers, Pintos, guns, demonic possession, the mafia, discos, homosexuals, the Vietnamese, sharks, fat, Chevy trucks, Saddam Hussein, witches, guns, TV evangelists, Seventh-Day Adventists, Iranians, militias, margarine, the year 2000, Catholic priests, guns, carbohydrates, homophobes, terrorists, boxcutters, shoes, more than four ounces of liquid, cash, Swiss Army knives, guns, and pressure cookers.
Years ago I was watching some television program and some stupid actress, in attacking the right to keep and bear arms, shouted, "What about my right to be safe?" Safety is not a right but a condition, a condition that, like many aspects of life, is relative. Safety is a lot like hunger, or not-hunger. Nobody has a "right" to have a full belly all the time, and even if some idiots amended the Constitution to forbid hunger, it would not change that reality. Nor would being full all the time be good for a person. A little hunger is healthy, so is a little danger.
When I'm out on my bike, I am not "safe". I am prudent, alert and cautious, but if someone else on the road does something stupid, I can be dead in seconds. A car gives more of a sense of safety, bigger cars feel safer than small cars, as well. But those are relative conditions. No one driving a vehicle at highway speeds is completely safe. If the driver of an eighteen-wheeler nods off at the wrong time, a Hummer won't save you. The extra, sensible vulnerability of riding a motorcycle actually makes me a better driver when I'm in a cage.
A realistic assessment of risk is helpful. Fear of any kind only limits our freedom and makes us easier to control. Thus, those who wish to control us keep coming up with new bogeymen to stir our fears. Meanwhile the real bogeyman is the government, the regulatory agencies, the TSA, the ATF, the IRS, the politicians and bureaucrats who want to render us helpless and dependent for the sake of their own agendas.
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