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Madelon Hoedt wrote:

Alfred Borden wrote:People sometimes ask me why I never smile when I'm about, and its pretty much for the reasons in this thread, maybe when someone sees a 6' 4" medium/well built guy with a moody look, they might just leave me alone

To what extent is the chance of being mugged influenced by general posture? I know (and have experienced) that people who might accost you in the street (for sales or conversion purposes) are much more likely to leave you alone if you walk upright, look confident and as if you know where you are going...

Yes, you are correct. But I always walk with purpose and confidence as well. Also, growing up on a council estate in London teaches you to be streetwise I guess

That said, we can all be the victims of bad luck

Attitude is everything in avoiding a mugging. That, and knowing when to walk on the other side of the street.

Another useful tip is to follow your sixth sense. That moment when something in your head just tells you it's a bad idea to walk down that road.

Your intuition has been built up throughout your life and without you knowing it, has made you aware of certain situations that just don't feel right.

If you get this feeling, act on it. Change your route, hail a cab, do anything but nothing.

As to how you carry yourself, it's best to be confident but not appear aggressive. This can be seen as a challenge to young gang members. It sounds weird but try not to look like a victim. I certainly wouldn't recommend Tony's method. A colleague of mine was punched in the face in broad daylight earlier this week and was in uniform at the time.

If they want to prove themselves, dont set yourself up as the ideal candidate.

Alec

BigShot wrote:We're a society that has been disarmed, discouraged from defence through instruction and through prosecution of those who defend themselves in a manner fitting the crime visited upon them.

Exactly this !!!

A bit off topic but a good example of that statement, the other day the kids of people who live a few doors down from me threw a few little bits of concrete through a hole in my fence at my 7month old puppy, i let it go as the pieces were small and it might of been a accident, the next minute a big lump of concrete about the size of just over half a brick comes flying through the gap at my puppies head !!!! I told the kids to pi$$ off and wait for the dad to come out to have a word with him. He comes out and i tell him if it'd hit my puppy in the face it could have killed him or at least not done him much good ! Now i've got a bit of a temper and love my dog to bits (i dont have kids or a flash car so just the dog for me lol) so i said that if it had of hit my dog in the face he would have felt the same thing after ! (Prob didnt handle it as well as i could but i was too angry to worry about that).

Well a friend of a friend told my Mrs that she's heard that a few of the people who live on my road are saying "who does he think he is throwing his weight around"

So nobody is talking about people throwing bricks at my puppy just what i said after

And to top it all off my dog is getting blamed for $hitting on someones front lawn ! Someone has even said they saw my dog do it !!! What makes that better is that in the 7months my puppy has been alive he's never even gone to the toilet outside on a walk !! Not once !!! he holds it till he gets home and goes into the garden !

I rely on eyes and ears as much as or more than intuition.
Many times I've been out and got that "something is very wrong here" feeling, ignored it and been right to do so. Far more, in fact, than I've been wrong about it.
Not to say the bad feeling should never be acted upon though.


Jon - I feel my attachment is a good illustration of why it panned out as it did.
"When I were a lad" if I'd been caught throwing rocks at a dog and been told to clear off, no matter how offensively, I would have moved heaven and earth to stop my parents from finding out about it.
That kids now go and tell their parents without fear of their lives is a terrifying sign of the times.
That the dad was anything other than apologetic and it was considered worthy of gossip with you cast as the bad guy is another.

I am NOT old enough to be reminiscing about how times used to be and how much better it was, but things have gone utterly insane.
I guarantee my kids will only make the mistake of acting up and then telling me someone told them off once or twice. They, like me, will learn quickly that you either behave or take what's coming to you if caught and don't expect anything other than punishment from parents if they are found out.

That picture is right mate ! The usual kids stuff is bouncing balls off peoples cars or windows by mistake (not that i ever did that as a kid either or i would have got a hiding lol) but i couldnt believe that someone would throw a lump of concrete at a animals face (maybe because im a dog lover).

Just because the other cowards (people in the street) would have just quickly and quietly taken there dog inside away from the kids until the next time it happened but i said something and stopped it there and then im now a thug throwing my weight around

Maybe they are right. You do sound a bit thuggish. :p

I mean there were ways to avoid confrontation AND avoid letting anyone know you were unhappy about something. Doing otherwise is clearly out of line.

Voice of experience. Recently someone picked up the key to my bike lock (it'd fallen out off my pocket) and rather than find out who's it was they took it home. I was stranded until 1am when someone brought my angle grinder to cut off the £90 lock so the bike wasn't stripped of its components by the next day. (Just for fun, try describing an angle grinder to someone who has no idea what one looks like!)
That I was anything other than sweetness and light about being down almost £100 through no fault of my own earned me accusations of "having a go" at the person who took me to one side to tell ME that I was out of line and a warning from the powers that be at the club I'm a member of.


Quite frankly, I think we both got off lightly. :p

ITV1 11:20 Tonight A documentary called Mugged, its a repeat of this which aired earlier this year.

http://www.itv.com/presscentre/mugged/w ... fault.html

Part of me wants to watch it, part of me is screaming "NO!!!"

Seeing the mugger's side could be a great insight (and the sample quote about a "rush" suggests I'm at least partly right in refusing to accept the orthodoxy that it's a product of circumstance and not a conscious choice) but I know it's just going to leave me with an ever deeper hatred of thieves and other assorted violent criminals and even more outraged that we've been disarmed and left defenceless against these predators.

I got mugged in Leicester once, shortly after having spent all my money on a pizza.

Irritatingly, all the things in my purse had a personal or sentimental value (reward cards, student ID, photo of girlfriend) but nothing in there was worth anything to the muggers except the purse itself and the pizza, which they also took. This was back when it was considered acceptable to not carry a mobile phone absolutely everywhere, so I managed to keep that.

Whilst I agree with the decoy strategy, you can't really surreptitiously carry a fake handbag. If I could give any piece of advice to myself back then it would be "Don't carry a pizza home through the poorly lit park at 2am".

In hindsight I'm probably lucky that I only got mugged. Don't we live in a terrible world?

-Stacy

Mugging for food isn't all that uncommon. I know someone who had their chips stolen after leaving a chippy many moons ago. Thankfully the chippy owner was a decent sort and gave her a bag on the house.

Honestly the sentimental stuff is the reason I get so annoyed at muggings. For almost anyone getting mugged the amount of money involved is relatively low and you're usually able to earn as much in a reasonably short time, but the loss of irreplacable things and the feeling of violation.


Oh and while I remember... "In hindsight I'm probably lucky that I only got mugged."
Not so much. Muggings are almost always done by people you don't know, the alternative I think you're talking about is almost always done by people you do know. Oddly for such a real and terrifying thought/fear, it's shockingly uncommon.

Terrible world? Nah, the world is wonderful - it's just the people preying on other people that ruin it (politicians and criminals alike - if you'll forgive the redundency there.)

Jon, you reacted with remarkable restraint after someone threw a brick at your dog. I don't know would I have held my temper.

A few years ago a friend of mine in a nice estate in Dublin found out that his son was being bullied by a local thug. He had a word with the thug, and thought that was the end of the matter. That night the thug's father knocked on the door. My friend though that he was there to apologise, but no - he was there to give out to my friend. So my friend decked him. No more trouble with bulling there. Sometimes the best way to curb thuggish behaviour is to meet it head on. We have become too soft and too non-confrontational.

I don't know that most of the advice in this thread is usable, but it's certainly food for thought. Thanks for the good words, too. I'll pass them on. It's odd getting a call from someone you haven't seen for a while telling you they've been mugged and not to call their mobile.

By the way, a great way to give your subconscious closure on a street attack is to find a relaxing space (bed, for example, before dropping off to sleep), close your eyes, relax, and replay the run up to the attack in as much detail as possible. At the appropriate moment, turn the tables. Pull a gun, stomp the swine, anything you like. Really make him suffer. It's your imagination after all, so go nuts and get it all out. I guarantee you'll feel a LOT better.

Apart from someone trying to take something out of my backpack while in Petersburg, I've never been "properly" mugged before (although I probably shouldn't say that out loud). I guess the prospect of having the redheaded fury of a 6'2" Dutch woman descend on them isn't that alluring for muggers.

Or I just look poor

Still, sympathies to everyone (including Tomo's friend) who did have to go through such an experience!