Like usually every minute I’d quickly look around to make sure there aren’t weirdos following me.

For context: I’m a young-adult male, but I don’t exactly have training in martial arts or anything, so I’m every time I see anyone that looks “tough” I don’t feel safe.

When I was a kid, my parents told me the usual “stranger danger” talk. Also in movies and tv, there are usualy a lot of plot involving peoppe getting followed, and the victim never looks back. In crime stories, and in the news, people usually become a victim if a bad person follows them home.

So when I went to school as a kid/teen, I’d always be scanning my surroundings like very often, especially when nearing home, I’d be like looking around every 20 seconds to see if there’s weirdos following.

Even as a young adult, I kinda still have this instinct. I mean, we hear about crime everywhere. I don’t exactly live in a “slum”, but I live in a big city, and more people generally means more crime, and statistically, crime is sort of an issue where I live, I mean, it’a a city, you know how it is. This is in the US btw.

I don’t carry a gun, don’t wanna have intrusive thoughts about killing myself so I don’t want that, so I carry pepper spray just in case.

I mean, I’m probably not gonna change my behavior, I think its good to be cautious, this question is just me trying to see if there’s anyone else out there think thinks like me.

  • IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    Nah. Freaking out over low risk events is called anxiety.

    Very very few people are just raped on the street.

    • 1 in 5 women have been victims of attempted or completed rape. 10% are by strangers, so 1 in 50 women in the US have been raped by strangers. There are 167.84 million females in the US. That means 3.34 million women in the US have been raped by strangers.

      Your definition of “very very few” is much different than mine.

      • IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world
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        17 hours ago

        So well well under 1% and of those occurrences you still haven’t accounted for walking home on a street. 👌👍