You Cannot Assume You Are Safe Anywhere

You can do everything “right” and still get blindsided by a stranger in broad daylight. That’s the unsettling thread running through this conversation, and it’s why we’re reframing preparedness away from fantasy disasters and toward the risks that actually show up in normal life: robbery, assault, random attacks, and public-space violence that can happen in any neighborhood. 

From my perspective as a long-time police officer, I share why the world feels different than it did 10 or 20 years ago. We talk through what I see as major drivers: a catch-and-release mindset that puts repeat offenders back on the street fast, a rise in untreated mental health issues, and a fentanyl and meth drug epidemic that makes some encounters more volatile and unpredictable. I also point to the growing number of people who act like consequences don’t exist, whether that’s individual violence or group chaos done for attention online. 

Then we get practical. I lay out simple, repeatable personal safety habits that improve your odds immediately: situational awareness, staying off your phone when you need your senses, walking with purpose, and having a quick plan when someone approaches aggressively. We also cover everyday carry options like a flashlight or pepper spray and the importance of checking local laws before you carry anything for self-defense. 

If this hits home, subscribe for more common-sense preparedness, share the episode with a friend, and leave a review so more people find it. What’s one safety habit you want to build starting today?

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

You are listening to the Common Sense Practical Prepper. Monstered by Duct Tape. The real duct tape. It fixes everything except that decision. Good evening, Mr. and Mrs. America. From border to border, coast to coast, and all ships at sea. Here is your host, Keith.

Prepared For Real Life Threats

Why Random Attacks Feel Worse

What You Can Do Outside

Carry Legal Tools And Close

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Hey all, this is Keith, and you're listening to the Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast for April the 16th, 2026. So, folks, being prepared is not always about having extra batteries, six months of beans and rice, and having a way of cooking your food in an extended SHTF situations. More than not, being prepared is being prepared for things that will happen in your day-to-day life. Now, the odds of an extended grid-down type situation where the power is going to be out for several days or several weeks is relatively small. However, it's not zero. But given in the screwed-up, crazy world we currently live in, I'm a firm believer that you have a better chance of being a victim of violence. Robbed, shot, stabbed, sexually assaulted. I believe the odds of that happening are much, much greater than an extended SHTF situation. No, far greater than just a minor SHTF situation. Far greater than a tornado or hurricane or severe storm coming through your town and knocking the power out for two or three days. I'm not sure if it's me. I'm not sure if it's my algorithm on X or the other social medias that I peruse, but it appears to me that more and more people are being randomly attacked for absolutely no reason. A woman out for a jog the other day was murdered. You can't walk your dog in a nice neighborhood. You can't walk your dog in a bad neighborhood. People just walking down the street in broad daylight are being attacked, murdered, and seriously injured. Other people get attacked on buses, trains, even sitting inside a restaurant trying to have a meal with family or friends. I know it sounds like a cliche, but it's almost like you're not safe anywhere. So I have looked for official statistics on these random attacks, and here's the deal. So people will often ask me, why is it so much worse than it was 10, 15, 20 years ago? So here's my take. For the last several years, we've had a catch and release mentality in the justice system, where violent offenders are back on the street the same day, no bond, very low bond, and they're out on the street again to commit more crimes. As a police officer of 26 years, I am here to tell you that most of the folks, and it depends on what they are arrested for, most of those folks will re-offend before their initial court date, or if they're released on some sort of probation, some sort of suspended sentence, they will offend again and have to come back in front of the judge, where many times the judge will resuspend the time from the original crime and they might serve a minimum time in jail. There is a massive increase in untreated mental health, especially homeless people on the streets. Drug epidemic, fentanyl, meth, it's making people far more aggressive and unpredictable than in the past. And there's a growing number of folks out there that simply have nothing to lose and don't care about consequences. They are not familiar with there being consequences to your actions. You look at all these flash mobs or street takeovers, more and more of these you see in the news were just mobs of young adults running through towns, parks, cities, shopping areas, and either tearing things up, looting, or just causing normal chaos, all for a TikTok video and a couple clicks on Instagram. Just in the last several months, just off the top of my head, the young lady about two weeks ago who was killed while jogging in Orlando, multiple women being assaulted as they're walking through downtown Chicago, some in broad daylight. A woman was set on fire, a random attack, I believe that was in New York City last year on a subway. A man stabbed to death on a train in Charlotte, North Carolina, New York City. People being stabbed, robbed, pushed in front of subway trains, a woman stabbed in the neck while sitting on the bus in Los Angeles, just people trying to go about their business. It's not like it's two in the morning and your car broke down in a bad neighborhood. It's you walking down the street in a major metropolitan city at noon with hundreds of people around, and someone will just come up at random, attack, assault, stab, or worse, kill this person who was just minding their own business. So anymore, you're truly not safe in any neighborhood. Good neighborhood, bad neighborhood. I think we can just get away from calling neighborhoods good or bad in this sense because you're gonna get assaulted or robbed or worse, regardless of the neighborhood and regardless of the time of day. The world has changed unfortunately, and you can no longer assume that you're safe anywhere. And it is extremely unfortunate that this is how we are currently living. Nobody wants to go outside and be hyper-vigilant. Nobody wants to go outside and have their head on a swivel. We just want to go about our life, we just want to go to the store, we just want to go to work, we want to come home and spend time with our family, have a barbecue on the weekends, go to a baseball game or what have you. But given the society we are living in right now, you cannot simply or automatically assume that everything is going to be okay when you go outside. Last night I was putting together this script and I saw an alert on my signal app that there was a mass shooting at a Walmart about 30 minutes from my house. Couple people injured and two people dead. Late last night, former lieutenant governor of Virginia, I believe, a murder suicide, left two kids behind, killed his wife, shot himself, and both young children were in the house. So when we go outside, when we leave the relative safety of our home, what can we actually do? I've said it twenty times before, I'll say it another twenty times. Situational awareness is key. Now, this means keeping your head up and actually looking around you, not staring at your phone. You need to see trouble before it gets to you. Second, change the way you carry yourself. Walk with confidence, walk with a purpose. Criminals look for easy targets, and those easy targets are the people who look distracted, weak, or appear to be lost in their own little world. If you're walking on a sidewalk and you're staring at your phone, but granted, a lot of people can multitask. They can walk down the street and they can look at their phone at the same time, but you don't know what's coming in front of you, beside you, or behind you. Walk with a purpose. You don't have to be Billy Badass throwing your shoulders out, look at me, look at me, nobody screw with me. All I'm saying is walk with a purpose. Walk like you know what you're doing, walk like you know where you're going. And many times we do know where we're going, but don't just lollygag and look all around, looking at your watch, looking at your phone, because people will see that and think that you're not aware of your situation. Perhaps you're lost and you're not paying attention. In that sense, you could be seen as a potential target. Next, have a plan in your head for every situation or for as many situations as you can. If someone approaches you aggressively, you need to know and advance. You need to know whether you're going to run, whether you're going to create distance, or if it's a significant threat, are you going to fight? Hesitation gets people hurt. And finally, carry something that you can use to defend yourself. A flashlight, a pepper spray, tactical pen, some kind of knife, some kind of firearm, depending on where you live. Please check your local ordinances, laws, in the city, county, country, state, wherever you live. Make sure that whatever you decide to carry is legal. This is not about being paranoid. This is about being prepared for the reality that we live in. And unfortunately, it's a very sad reality. And I think about this all the time. Twenty years ago was it this bad? Fifteen years ago was it this bad? 10 years ago, 10 to 12 years ago, I think it really started getting bad. And I think it has a lot to do with people not understanding that there are consequences for their actions. If you do something wrong and you get caught, you're gonna be punished. But more and more today, people get caught, they get punished, and they immediately go out and do it again. The recidivism rate among inmates and people in jail and prison is through the roof. Again, depending on the crime, and many times they will be a repeat offender. So again, it's not about being paranoid, not trying to scare everybody, but it's a crazy screwed-up world we're living in. We are not going to be the victims. We are gonna pay attention and at the expense of maybe not being able to enjoy our day as much, not really being able just to tune out the outside world and walk around in your little bubble because that's not gonna work. If you can't just walk down the street minding your own business and not be considered a potential target, so I'm really not sure what we're doing then. It's a crazy mixed-up world. Thanks again, folks. I really appreciate everybody stopping by. If you need to reach me, practical preppodcast at gmail.com. Of course, I'm on the Twitters, prep underscore podcast. You can always search Common Sense Practical Prepper Podcast. And I haven't forgot about the mailbag issue. I have about 12 emails. I will get to that. I know I've been saying that for the last two weeks, but I will definitely get to those emails. All right, folks, as always, please be careful out there. Take care of one another, and until next time.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

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