going bare....do you feel safe?

btgc said:
Read somewhere about master of martian arts. He was asked how he would act in dark alley, seeing approaching strangers with bad intents. "I would do my best to not appear there" master replied. Sure, life isn't as simple but there's wisdom.
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I wouldn't mess with a Martian, or master of their arts, myself. Who knows what they'd be capable of...
 
louisb said:
Well, even though we seem have imported most of eastern europe into the east end guns are still very unusual.

I just fancy smashing an assailant in the face with the Hass and then standing over them and saying "in all the confusion, punk, I don't know if I took 11 or 12 exposures. Well, do you feel lucky punk?"

This is all fantasy of course, the best action is always to hand over everything...

LouisB
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"...of course I will assume the submissive posture
But men aren't wolves so it probably won't help."

- Auden
:D
 
I've had way more cameras stolen from my dwelling when I was not there, than taken from me by force or cunning.
 
I carry my stuff all over the world including Downtown LA which can be super sketchy - just act like you belong there and all is good.
 
Guys, you caught me on martians - it was late, I were tired and...you know, truth is out there :) But if martians know same wisdom as martial masters do - good to them!
 
I think the comments about being aware of your surrounding are the most important in this thread. The other stuff about carrying clubs, or guns, is just silly, that isn't a deterrent, that is a last line of defense.

Keeping aware in dangerous areas is important not only to keep a watch out for what you might walk into, but what you could be taking a picture of. I know I've seen a few people in the bad end of some big cities un-aware that they seemingly have a drug deal going on in frame. To me, that type of stuff is just an unneeded level of risk, I don't need to have some druggy chasing me down for catching a shot of him getting his stash, or the dealer wigging out on me for being a cop. Theres little things like that which could provoke a response that everyone needs to keep an eye for.

Overall, I've never felt unsafe due to my camera being a Leica, or Hassie or anything. Just like I've never felt like a victim because a group of guys is staring me down like I am a lottery ticket. Best thing to do to guys like that is to smile and say gooday as you walk past them, seems to totally mess them up.


Calzone said:
Also know that I have a Nikon F3P with motor drive and hand-strap that clearly can be used as a deadly weapon.
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I have a Nikon F3HP with the motor drive, and gotta say, that thing is without question a deadly weapon.
 
Just for some clarification:

I'm not going to be snooping around crack houses, not on purpose atleast. And I'm neither interested in taking pictures of thugs, druggies, and etc.

I currently live in the bay area so I oftentimes go to SF and Oakland and it is easy to slip into the wrong neighborhoods sometimes. The tenderloin is right next to union square, for instance. I am sure most of us have gone into some bad neighborhoods at some point in our lives...maybe because we are lost, it is along the way, or we are just wondering.

I'm not too worried about getting mugged or murdered and I do not avoid things because of those reasons but precautions can be made.

I'm really not sure what thefts are after but I don't think Leica is at the top of their agenda...I guess any camera can be equally attractive if they found it attractive enough to steal. With this said, I think I am more likely to get mugged if I were to wear Jordans around my feet than a camera around my neck, lol.
 
If the camera is in your hand, with a wrist strap, it attracts far less attention than hanging around your neck.

Get insurance.

Be smart, but live without fear. My sense is, doing a lot of work in New York City where I lived for 34 years, that cameras are so far from people's minds as items of value anymore you don't risk much with one in a rough neighborhood. In areas where professional thieves are looking for tourists with good cameras on their necks and fat bags hanging from their shoulders, that's another story. But even here if you have one small camera like a Leica and no big DSLR with obvious camera bag, even the pros would have to be very well informed to notice your rig.

Don't get drunk and leave your Leica in a cab. I did that once. I gave up drinking not long after.
 
Calzone said:
Nowadays its a badge of honor to kill someone or a situation can be part of a gang initiation.

Not sure the best course of action is to be passive. Heard too many stories where people were almost executed, except the gun jammed or a round was not chambered that confounded the would be robber. Consider that when someone pulls out a weapon, that giving them what they want to rob might not be good enough, and that really you might be giving up your own life.

Cal
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Gee, where do you people live??? Worst thing that's ever happenned to me living here in Happy Valley was to be woken up at 4am one morning by someone walking on my roof. Turned out to be a Koala Bear. No way I was going to hit it with my Leica.
 
An approach worth considering for safer photography...

If and when you're confronted by a would-be assailant, whip out your piece and wave it around like you know how to use it.

Should its size prove to be an insufficient deterrant, buy a bigger, heavier camera or failing that, a gun....
 
I probably won't say anything which haven't already been said, but seeing as I've been to most of the seedier parts of the world (At least it feels that way!) while working in the offshore industry, and I make it a point to carry a camera whenever possible - at least I have some experience doing just what you are wondering about.

a) Make sure your insurance covers theft. Some travel insurance policies generously define travel as 'being outside one's domicile', thus covering theft even if you're mugged standing on the pavement in front of your dwelling.

Then, if someone mugs you, just shrug and hand over everything. If you ask politely to be allowed to remove the film first, you might even be allowed to keep it all, having made the point that you are a luddite shooting film and that the camera is essentially worthless (I am being tongue-in-cheek; I prefer film myself.)

b) To the largest possible extent, look like you know where you are going/have some purpose, even if you're just strolling about looking for a photo op. If you are in the mugging business, it is a lot easier to go after the insecure, lost guy than the one who is clearly going somewhere; it implies that you are at least familiar with the neighborhood.

c) As for putting up a fight? Don't even think about it; if you lose - well, you lose. Even if you come out on top in whatever struggle ensues, you really wouldn't want to sort out the mess with the police afterwards. Most countries' legal system wouldn't just shrug off the use of lethal force as self defense; even if your camera kit is worth someone else's life to you - is it worth the inconvenience of being held in custody and quite possibly facing a lengthy trial and, possibly several years in prison afterwards?

d) Did I mention insurance?

e) Try your best to look like you're not worth the hassle. Shooting while wearing a gold Rolex, designer sunglasses and brand clothing while constantly uploading your shots to the Internet using your iPhone makes you way more of a target than if you were shooting wearing non-descript clothes, no watch, and your cell phone out of sight.

f) Make sure your insurance covers loss by theft, preferably at full replacement value.

g) Please do remember that the vast majority of people, no matter where they live, are fundamentally decent, helpful and friendly people - even those who look scary to you. Knowledge of a few phrases in the local language and a friendly smile will go a long way. Remember that nobody likes being assumed to have malicious intent. Appearing to be wary of the people you encounter will give you all the more reason to being so.
 
sparrow6224 said:
Don't get drunk and leave your Leica in a cab. I did that once. I gave up drinking not long after.
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I feel with you. I once left a Nikon FM2 with two lenses in a train because I was so much distracted by a book I was reading and nearly missed my station.

I considered it wasn't the books fault, continue reading to this day and got drunk to get over it. :p True story, I'm not kidding!
 
On a holiday in Greece I once left my OM1, OM2n and three lenses at a restaurant. It was still there ½ an hour later. what a relief
 
hepcat said:
Wow... what an interesting topic.

Everyone, please step back for a second and take a deep breath.

My 35 years in law enforcement, much of that on the street, gives me a different perspective. The media brings every major crime, regardless of its location, into your livingroom and makes it personal. Hearing that over and over and over makes the world appear to be a much more dangerous place than it really is. A little common sense, and situational awareness will do much to keep you safe anywhere in the world that you choose to go.

Just because there are "x" number of murders in a particular city, state, or country doesn't mean that just because you're walking through you're likely to be a murder, robbery, or assault victim and that's true even carrying an expensive camera in a violence-prone neighborhood.

Generally speaking, outside of countries currently considered 'war zones' or those fighting not to be controlled by drug cartels, your lifestyle is what makes you a likely murder victim. Most murder victims continue to be gang members or associates involved in illegal activity. Frankly, you're significantly more likely to be murdered by your spouse, a friend, or an acquaintance. That's how most homicide investigations are solved... the victim knows the suspect. Last, assaults and street robberies do occur, but they so infrequently result in a murder compared to gang and acquaintance murders that they're almost statistically insignificant.

Unlike thirty years ago, cameras have no value on the street any more as proceeds of robbery, and that especially applies to Leicas. No street thug is going to know how to unload one for cash in a world where every one has a cell phone camera.

Last, remember that if you don't conduct yourself like a victim, likely any potential predator will pass on you and move on to someone who appears less interested in potentially doing them harm. My mantra for years has been this version of the twenty-third Psalm... "Yea though I walk through the vally of death, I shall fear no evil... for I AM the meanest SOB in the valley." If you don't ACT like a victim, likely you won't BE a victim regardless of where you go.
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No disrespect to law enforcement, but the two times where I had guns pointed at me and I could of easily been either shot or killed the guns were in the hands of NYPD.

The first time was in the early seventies and the song "Heartbreaker" was a hit on the radio. The song was about a boy in a case of mistaken identity was shot and killed based on a true story involving the NYPD. Fight or flee are just instincts triggered by fear, and the wrong response cost this boy his life.

A similar event almost happened to me when two NYPD cops screached to a halt late one night and jumped out of their car with their guns drawn. If I ran, I figure I would of likely been shot. It seemed like the cops were hell-bent on revenge and were overly scared of a boney 15 year old boy. I lived in Valley Stream just inside the Nassau County border, but I knew of Tommy TXX from Rosedale, Queens because Asians at that time were a novelty. The only thing I can figure is that Tommy beat the crap of a NYPD cop with his bare hands, because the cops were clear that they would use deadly force because they stressed that any sudden move would make them shoot.

The second time was when I was 17 and working at a McDonald's when it got robbed. Things got ugly rather fast as a manager was being pistol whipped because he would not open the safe, a gunshot was fired by one of the four robbers, and when the NYPD eventually stormed the place I would have likely been ventilated if a shootout occurred because the guy who was beating the manager held a cardboard box full of money was standing right in back of me. It was only luck that his pistol laid on top of the money and was not in his hand.

Another bad experience involved the Nassau County Police happened when I was 19. It was an unusual Fourth of July that was not humid as young people gathered in a park next to the Nassau Coleseum. It was around dusk when I went to the bathroom by the band shell. When I enter a drunk just happen to throw a beer bottle into the stage area of the band shell and the glass broke with a resonating pop. By the time I left the bathroom a bunch of drunks had already emptied a few large green garbage bags of beer bottles, and all the braking of glass sounded like machine guns.

As I walked back towards my friends I saw police lining up in full riot gear. A young couple in love proudly displaying their bliss walked toward me, and then I heard the awful sound of a nightstick against someone's skull, as the boy walking towards me slumped to the ground. The girl knelt on the ground alongside her boyfriend, and then I heard that awful sound again, as the girl laid her head on her boyfriend's chest.

I was next. I looked at the cop judging him. I looked at him hard knowing that all he had to do is take one step forward and swing to take me down. I knew if I turned right away it would be a mistake, so I stood my ground. Perhaps the cop was not that mean that he would destroy my face, perhaps because I had witnessed him clubbing two innocent people he then knew that he did something wrong and he couldn't strike me down with me looking directly at him.

"Turn and leave the park," he said, but I knew not to trust him. "My friends are behind you and they have the car." Somehow I didn't get clubbed, but I was stranded without any money and had to hitchhike.

Violence when it happens comes unexpectedly, and please realize that being an Asian (Chinese) in the white suburbs of Long Island made me a target where I could be jumped at anytime, and the first thing I learned in Kindergarten is how to fight. The Vietnam War, looking like the enemy, standing out in a crowd in a white community, understand it became natural to stand my ground, and fighting has been part of my upbringing to combat racial violence stems from childhood. I was born in 1958 and the 1960 cencus counted about 238,000 Asians in the U.S. and about half of those counted were Chinese. Violence I learned can happen at any time and anywhere.

Cal
 
Anders Petersen Interview
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/get-the-hell-out-of-there


==== BEGIN QUOTE
What kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into?
I think I carry the Swedish national record in getting robbed. I’ve been robbed some 13 times. One of the scariest times was in Las Palmas, on the Canary Islands. Two guys came up to me going, “Take our picture.” And so I did. Then they said, “Hey, what are you doing? You took our picture!”--the oldest trick in the book, I know—and went on, “You need to get rid of it.” When I refused, one of the guys took out a knife and told me to give him my camera. He came closer, waving the knife at me, while the other dude started undoing my pants. I was standing with my back against the wall and he was tapping the knife against my glasses. The other guy was pulling down my pants, and by now a crowd had gathered to watch. The dude by my legs hung himself in my balls, while the guy with the knife was stabbing the blade into the front of my glasses. I grabbed my camera and pushed it against his chest so that he could just grab it and leave, and it worked.


Jesus, how do you bounce back from that?
Oh, you always bounce back. In such situations, the main thing is to not panic, to deflate the situation and to erase the perception of being a victim.
======= END QUOTE
 
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