this ever changing world in which we live in

Had to start with a Paul McCartney quote. How else to start anything on the right foot?

So my mom, in a bout of her usual Internet paranoia, decided to go to this site and look up registered sex offenders in our neighborhood. Pretty scary, to say the least. Looking at the pictures of the offenders, it makes you shudder; you can see in their eyes and face that something just isn't right. Something has snapped inside and these people have become consumed with horrific, evil desires to do things that are far below humanity.

I've read statistics, I've seen bits of the MSNBC "To Catch a Predator", I've spoken with our resident expert on crime, Dr. Durkin....but I can't make up my mind as to the level of fear I should hold. Clearly there are lots of twisted people willing to do horrible things out there. That can't be denied. (The question of "Why does God allow this stuff to exist in this world?" is one for another day...)

But how much can you worry, or rather, how much can you turn a blind eye? To one extreme, you can totally shut your eyes. You can pretend this kind of evil doesn't exist, turn up the happy music, and live in denial. To the other extreme, you can see yourself as a warrior, always having to be on guard, always fighting to protect yourself from the worst kind of evil, being overly cautious and paranoid, and never going outside alone for fear of what might happen.

Shit happens in this world, no matter how prepared or "aware" you are of it. Tragic accidents, violent crime...these things happen to people who fear it and to people who don't expect it. May God grant that none of us ever are faced with the horrible kind of evil these offenders represent.

You can't prevent awful things from happening, but you might also be able to take steps to avoid them. But what steps are too far? Let's return to our two extremes: You could never get in a car for fear of crashing, never talk to new people for fear they might be a psycho killer (fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa), never enjoy a nice solitary walk outside for fear of being attacked...or you could blindly assume everyone you see is safe and that "nothing will ever happen to me". Two extremes. Where is the balance?

The problem with a "moderate" stance, as with anything in the middle, is that there's no clearly defined answer. I guess one just has to try their damndest to be cautious without being paranoid, be outgoing without being unaware of potential danger. I also think we have an instinct, a way of picking up "vibes" from people. Brian Wilson sang about "good vibrations", and we can also pick up bad ones; that uneasy feeling you get seeing a picture of a rapist tells you something on a primal level, that on some subconscious level something is not right. This instinct can be a useful thing. Oh yeah, and you should probably ask God for guidance too, of course. He knows. Everything.

Thoughts?