Tuesday, April 6, 2010

QOTD

"He that's secure is not safe."

-Benjamin Franklin

Discuss.

11 comments:

Jay G said...

"There is no safety this side of the grave."

-Jubal Harshaw, "Stranger in a Strange Land"

Mike W. said...

Well yeah, I could be securely locked in a room full of homicidal, psychopathic midgets and yet not be safe.....

Alan said...

There is no such thing as "safe" as an absolute. There are degrees of risk in any activity.

Same for secure.

Besides, all things wither before time.

Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we all die.

gunnypink said...

Security does blunt vigilance. Being snug as a bug in a rug, does not prevent you from being stepped on.

Joanna said...

The feeling of security leads to complacency. The constant struggle for security, OTOH, leads to greater awareness and vigilance. In other words, if you think the job's done, it's obviously not.

Ed Rasimus said...

Franklin is often quoted in this regard. The more familiar is the one about essential liberty in exchange for security and having neither.

The underlying fact is that we all give up some liberty to exist in a society. In return the society offers us some level of security. The problem is where on the spectrum between total liberty (i.e. anarchy) and total security (i.e. Super-Max, Florence CO) we want to be.

We used to opt for the liberty end. Terrorists seek to drive us to the security end and in the process get the society to rebel against the repressive government.

Bottom line is with the current response to the threat and the direction of the nation, we're screwed.

Unknown said...

If your security arrangements are untested, then you have no idea if you will be safe when ugly reality encroaches.

Familiarization, practice, awareness of surroundings can get you so far. I spent some time as a police officer back in the revolver days. I never had a firearm pointed at a few times, including once where the pucker factor was very high.

But in the 30 some odd years since, I have never come close to being tested, and quite frankly, I hope I never will.

Anonymous said...

Some people are afraid of those who are secure (i.e. independant) and are willing to act on being threatened thusly?

Jim

Old NFO said...

Ummm... what they said... sigh... I HATE coming in late :-(

B Smith said...

"We don't have no rules here...we're trying to accomplish something. Rules? We make them up as we go along."
---Alcee Hastings.

Disgust.

Alan said...

Is Breda. Is not safe.