Most people are trusting... to a fault

My girlfriend and I were getting out of the car after parking in a parking lot, looked over at a mother, grandmother, and 3 kids getting out of a car.
Grandma: How do you lock it?
Mom: Just leave it unlocked.
Grandma: You can't just leave it unlocked.
Mom: No one is going to steal it. Besides, how would they know it's unlocked?
Grandma looks reluctant, but says nothing
Me walking by: I know it's unlocked...
Mom: But would you steal it?
Me: Doesn't matter.

I thought of a few things I could have added later (and was upset I didn't remember them at the time);
Criminals are busting into cars, (or opening unlocked cars) and getting garage door openers and registration. Few people lock the door between their garage and their house, so armed with your address off your registration, they open your garage and ransack your house and leave... if you're lucky.

I know for a fact that that woman didn't suspect even for a moment that by leaving her car unlocked she was letting criminals into her house. She may even have been secretly hoping it would be taken so she could get another car with the insurance money.

Mom walks into her home after her car is taken: Tee Hee! I "forgot" to lock my car, and now the insurance will buy me a new car! I'm so smart!... Honey? Is that you?

I hope that bothered you to read, because it bothered me to type it. It's very simple. When you come hope, you relax because you're safe and comfortable inside your home. To have someone gain such easy access completely unbeknownst to you (especially at your fault) is a huge violation on many levels.

This is a simple thing that could wind up saving the lives of yourself and your children. To anyone who would say "That's a bit far-fetched! What are the chances that could happen to me!?" I say that if there is a .00000001% chance of the situation happening to you, you'd better prepair for it. Because if the possibility isn't a flat 0% you need to know that it happened to someone, and it may as well have been you (and may be in the future).

If the chances are 1,000,000 to 1, there's still one person who had it happen to them; and I'll bet money that they didn't think it would happen to them either.

I'm not saying that you should take extraordinary measures to ensure the safety of yourself and your family, I'm just saying that a little bit of effort here and there goes a long way toward protecting your loved ones.

There's no reason to be paranoid either, you shouldn't suspect everyone, I'm just saying that we don't exactly live in a utopia. The argument "I live in a good neighborhood" is well and good until your neighbor murdered in a home invasion robbery. And if you have kids, remember that they trust and depend on you to protect them. If you put them at risk just because you didn't want to take an extra few seconds to lock the door behind you, or check the windows before bed, or just because you don't think something like that would happen to you, the blame falls entirely on you. You've failed. And what if you survive an attack but your children don't? Was it worth the carelessness?