Friday, December 23, 2011
Home Alone
A Louisville teenager had a scare today. While he was home alone today, a couple of thugs broke into his home, held him at knife point, and ransacked the house. One of the fine upstanding proactive property redistributors held a knife to his throat and asked if he wanted to die. How charming.
This one hits close to home. Girlie Bear spends about an hour or so every afternoon at the house alone when she gets home from school. Also, sometimes we can't get a whole day off work to be home with her if she's home for a day off of school, so she may spend half a day alone. We don't worry about her doing anything she shouldn't. She's a responsible young lady, and we haven't had any issues with her being by herself so far.
But what should she do if she's surprised by someone in the house when she gets home or if someone breaks in when she's home alone?
My advice to her has been to run. She has to fight as hard as she can to get away, but she has to get away. I'm under no illusions that even my hellcat of a daughter can physically subdue or drive off robbers. Because Boo is so young, all of our guns are religiously locked up, and Girlie Bear doesn't have the combination to any of the safes. To be honest, I would consider myself a fool to think that a 13 year old, either boy or girl, would have the wherewithal to unlock a safe under stress when I have to practice it regularly myself.
So what do y'all think? Do you tell your kids to defend themselves and the home, cooperate with the thugs, or run like their ass was on fire and get help?
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7 comments:
as a former young female, I say RUN!
Yes, run.
However...
Since she IS responsible, there's no reason why she can't learn a combination and practice opening a safe under stress. Don't expect her to count on it, but don't underestimate her competence and her ability to keep her head. Most modern "empowerment" of females falls into the "participation trophy" category. *If she has the aptitude and the judgment,* give her a tool of genuine empowerment, and give her a second safely option.
One of the issues I have with gun safes is that they restrict your access to a weapon in a hurry. Yes I understand you have cubs and can't stash your weapons around the house, but (depending on your state and local laws) one of those electronic keypad pistol safes might be a reasonable recourse. Five digits of her choice are a lot easier to input than a traditional L-R-L dial lock.
Running is one option, but how many 13 year old girls can outrun a determined rapist, or a half-assed attacker with a weapon? I dunno, but I'd not like to make odds on it.
I like the idea of a safe for HER, can she handle a smaller shotgun? someone made a shotgun "safe" designed to lock it against small kids, but allow quick access. It only actually locked the trigger/moving parts area of the gun and was designed to be wall mounted. MArooned mentioned it once, it was probly at least a year ago. Maybe I'll see if I can find the link, I was thinking I wanted one......
RUN should always be a top priority, but if she's caught by surprise with them between her and the easy exit its not always feasable, though my folks made sure I practiced and KNEW how to escape safely from my 2nd floor bedroom window (admitedly for fires, but....), if her bedroom IS on the 2nd floor, maybe one of those compact/rolled fire ladders thats designed to be deployed in a hurry?
that was easier to find than I expected, the ShotLock: http://www.shotlock.com/Details.asp
I found one blurb on it that stated Costco carried them for $130, I didn't hit their site to confirm that.
Gotta add, incase I wasn't clear before, when I said "run should always be a priority" I meant for her, at her age.
I'm with Rauðbjorn and Ruth. Get her a simple, easy-to-open gun safe of her own (although not so simple that Boo can get into it), and provide her with a weapon she can use to good effect. If she's not willing to practice much, I suggest a 20ga. youth model shotgun; if she's willing to put in the time and effort needed to master it, I suggest a handgun in a meaningful defensive caliber.
She's your daughter. In this day and age, you can't afford to risk leaving her defenseless. If you disagree, just think how you'd feel if you came home one day to find the cops and the coroner outside, and have to listen to their account of what some scumbag did to her. Enough said.
WV - 'miesses' - make sure she hits the bad guy, not miesses him!
I don't know what stands between you and you neighbours but I would have to say run.
You will need to work out an escape route as well as a destination depending on where she exits the house, be that a window, front door or back door. You would also need to check what obstacles lay in her path and how to overcome them. I think she also needs to bring attention to herself and not just run silently. It would be the time to exercise her lungs with a God Almighty scream that’s continuous and loud enough to get neighbours looking out their doors and windows. A scream like that needs practice to override any of our pre-existing social restrictions. I don’t know what security you have over your windows but in case she has barricaded herself in a room she needs to know that it is OK, if necessary, to break glass. A glass window pane can be like bars because we are taught not to break them. If she is to break a window she would need to know what to break it with, how to make it safe and how to safely exit.
I think arming a young person is a big ask. They have to be prepared to kill someone and if she can’t then the weapon could be taken from her and used against her.
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