So... maybe it does... I get it...
But is that really something to advertise?
I took this picture a few months ago, with the intent to post it here for discussion. I've thought about it a bit. Why is this message being advertised? Like... awareness I guess? but like... if I don't lock my car... and some one steals stuff... they will... necessarily become more brazen and steal more stuff (including my identity)?
When I first read it, I just thought it felt like a strange message: "Lock your car or you are not stopping identity theft." It's like they looked at statistics and then formed them into sentences to scare people.
But it's so much worse than I thought.
http://lockdownyourcar.org/about/
The website is from these people:
- Coloradans Against Auto Theft is a coalition of law enforcement agencies, insurance partners, LoJack and AAA Colorado. CAAT and the state auto theft task force efforts are funded in part by the Colorado Auto Theft Prevention Authority (CATPA). CAAT was created to promote the cumulative statewide efforts in the prevention of auto theft.
And to make matters worse... I AM PAYING FOR THE ADVERTISING WHICH IS BLAMING ME FOR THE PROBLEM:
- Funding
Senate Bill 08-060, the Colorado law that went into effect on July 1, 2008, established new mandatory funding for the Colorado Auto Theft Prevention Authority (CATPA) through 2018. CATPA is a cash-funded program that awards grants through the required annual collection from insurance companies of $1.00 for every insured vehicle.
Why Consumer Insurance Dollars?
State legislators intended for this to be a direct investment by consumers to combat auto theft and ultimately lower car insurance premiums.
All Colorado drivers are victims of auto theft because we all pay for it through increased insurance premiums.
For the individual auto theft victim, in addition to paying the insurance deductible, there are other costs such as insurance premium increases, the time spent working with the police, vehicle rental fees and time off from work.
Whatever you sons of bitches... whatever. I'm stealing the next one of those signs I see.
The psychology is simple: the public can be influenced if a few individuals can be influenced. Car prowl increases the crime rate. An increased crime rate increases further crime. Broken windows theory is controversial but even its detractors acknowledge that crime begets crime. What's hilarious, though, is that Colorado don't even rate. A guess? You've got some shitty insurance companies that saw a way to lower their claims without having to lower their premiums.
That thing's legendary, dawg. American victory in WWII was due partly to our available supply of materiel. Japan and Germany were out of gas; we were not. The more gas you have, the more sorties you can run. The more ships you can put to sea. The more tanks you can send across the Oder. Thus, stateside efforts during the war were largely given over to using every last bit of available supply and applying it to killing Japs and Nazis. Modern awareness, of course, is due to those incredulous 'tards over at Reddit, reposting from FunnyJunk because of course they did. It's not like this shit was underground. You probably recognize the bottom image.
I guess I’m more familiar with the Canadian propaganda which mainly seem to focus on victory bonds. This got me thinking though, our population is so god damn small compared to America. In 1939 we had just over 11 million people compared to 130.9 million in the states. You probably had more cars than we had people. Yup, apparently you guys had 26,501,443 vehicles by 1929 before we even had 11 million people. Not sure how much our own oil industry affected WW2 though, apparently we didn’t realize Alberta full potential until 1947 and instead imported from America up until then. Which I guess answers the question of how we became one big mostly happy country instead of a bunch of small countries constantly fighting. We were basically Canada, doing our thing and then we got resources after we had allies and all that set up. There’s probably more to that as well.
Friend of mine has dual citizenship. His bachelor's was in Canadian Studies. He told me once that to understand Canada, you need to understand that 90% of Canadians live within 100 miles of the US border. Canada is a sovereign nation. I would never suggest otherwise. But as a sovereign nation, it is often culturally and economically beholden to a much more influential neighbor. Economically, demographically and politically speaking, California has more influence on world affairs than Canada. I had a (Canadian) film producer point out to me once that from an export standpoint, Chile has more more media distribution than Canada. When was the last time you saw a Chilean film? Heard a Chilean song? Read a Chilean book?
Ya I’m honestly not sure the last time I watched something Canadian other than a few things my friends have made and basically all my friends who graduated college/did something with their lives are in the industry so that probably says something. Come to think of it, the habit of pointing out when something was filmed in Canada but set in America is kind of weird. We do it all the time, like hey that’s Canada ! but they’re pretending it’s somewhere else because nobody would care otherwise. Damn.
That's because Canadian Content laws make it vastly cheaper to shoot in Canada than in California. And we hate you for it. Had a chat with the DIT on Tron. Producers wouldn't let him bring his own assistant - he had to hire a Canadian assistant. DIT didn't want a Canadian assistant, he wanted the guy he'd been working with for ten years. Offered to take a pay cut to pay the assistant out of his own share - talkin' $550 a day for four months. Was told by the production that they were saving so much in incentives that it would cost them money for him to pay his assistant himself. Next movie out? Yeah, they went with the Canadian assistant as DIT.
You gripe, I gripe. If people in my neighborhood would lock their car doors and stop leaving valuable stuff in their cars than car prowls would go down. When I used to be on NextDoor, there would be at least one post a week where someones car got broken into and their wallet, purse or laptop was stolen. I've been to neighborhood crime prevention meetings where people yell at the Captain that they want all the car break ins stopped. The captain says, lock your car and stop leaving valuable stuff in there, we try to catch them but we can't catch them all and you folks being more defensive will make a bigger difference than we can. The people say, Captain, stop the care break ins again... I know some of the cops on the night shift. They would love to make some arrests but the reality is even if they do the guys won't be off the street very long. If people would just lock their fucking doors and stop leaving their valuables in plain site thieves would move on to easier neighborhoods. CAAT sounds like bullshit btw.
Locking your doors just means you get your window broken as an added bonus. Imo leaving the car locked or unlocked doesn't really change much but removing valuables does. If the local crackhead looks through your car finds nothing and moves on there isnt any damage except the uncomfortable feeling that someone when through your shit looking for valuables.
Breaking windows make a lot of noise in a dense urban neighborhood. I don't know anyone who's had their windows broken. I do know one guy who had their rag top cut open. Leaving your door unlocked means that you have a dead battery in the morning. For some reason, I'm guessing that it's in to make less noise, everyone's door is left open after they get car shopped.
Pretty in line with what cgod had to say, people in rural Canada are really upset about how many break ins they’ve been experiencing for some unknown reason. It’s just, they sing songs about beer, trucks, dogs and how they don’t lock the door were they come from. I get having a sense of pride in being from a nice wholesome neighbourhood but maybe don’t broadcast that too everybody. Which I guess is what upsets people, because they feel they are being blamed and saddled with the burden of fixing the problem when they are the victim. I get that and I also get not wanting them to just move on to another neighbourhood because that just shifts the problem. I’m all for doing the things that actually fix the problem but in the mean time I’m locking my door. I think that’s sometimes the problems, people don’t feel that law enforcement/ government or whatever are looking long term. They feel like they’re just telling everybody to shut up and lock their doors.