Let's discuss, shall we?

inspired by my hesitation to discuss in discussion class

Family Watchdog

Have you ever been on FamilyWatchdog?  If you haven't and you're going to, do yourself a favor and proceed with caution.  I remember the first time I heard about the website - I was living in good ol' Cincinnati and I decided to give it a shot.  The idea is great, you search for criminals in the area and you're in the know.  You read their offenses, you put a face to the name and it's committed to memory.  Well, have you ever heard of that saying, "what you know won't hurt you"?  There might be an ounce of truth in it.  This site can make you overly-paranoid.  Case-in-point, my excessive door locking.  While I'm not denying that it is better to know than to be naive, skipping around singing la-dee-da and pretend that life is one big Pleasantville, it can be a bit of a shock when you type in your address.  Go ahead, give it a go - I'll wait.

So now that that's out of the way and you're arranging new accommodations until you can move to a safer part of town (if there is one), I wanted to go ahead and share with you some of my previous cities of residence and amaze you with all the beautiful colors of crime.

Location: Thornton, CO 

Population: ~113,000

Diagnosis: Really not as bad as I would've thought.  On a scale of 1-10, I give it a 4 on the scary scale.

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Location: Naperville, IL aka Pleasantville, America

Population: ~145,000

Diagnosis: Pretty much what you'd expect when you live in Pleasantville.  I give it a 1.5 out of 10.

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 And then I moved to Cincy...

Location: Cincinnati, OH

Population: ~333,000

***Population of Criminals:  ~330,000 (personal estimation)

Diagnosis: Honestly?  You can barely read the town names/major highways.  Yeah I give it a 9.  Good God - it's the Criminal Headquarters...or so I thought...

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 And then there was Chicago...

Location: Chicago, IL

Population: ~2.85 million

***Population of Criminals:  ~2.8 mil (personal estimation)

Diagnosis: Notice the wider variety of colors.  Cincy has a lot of green, though not excusable, it's a slightly lesser offense.  Red and Yellow are the big leagues.  They play for keeps.  I realize the population density has a lot to do with the amount and may be unfair in comparison to the other cities but still...I mean...come on.  That's undoubtedly an 11 or 12 out of 10.

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 Ann Arbor, here I come

Location: Ann Arbor, MI

Population: ~114,000

Diagnosis: It's like there was a criminal background check for every person to live here and only a few slipped through the cracks.  It's a huge relief but obviously no place is too safe so I'll give it a 1 out of 10 for safe measure.

Pretty astonishing I'd say.  FamilyWatchdog can either scared the living baJesus out of you or it can put your mind at ease.  Should you just use the normal deadbolt on the front door?  Or should you reinforce it with oh say, a chair or a spare mattress?  Should you jog around with just mace?  Or should you bring mace and Hank, your Doberman?  Do you want to know?  Or would you prefer to be surprised?  You decide.  Once you discover this website, you'll probably sit there for a good hour or so looking at criminals in your area and areas you know.