Mailbox of doom?

We all know, or should know, that ATM use has its risks. People in urban areas (what we used to call cities) are routinely warned to be cautious when using any sort of cash machine, especially at night and especially in dodgy neighborhoods. Dumb punks will rob you as soon as you have your dough, even force you to take out more. Smart punks will use skimmers to get your card data and clear out your accounts. When security cameras were placed in the machines and the surrounding areas, they helped deter some of these bad acts, at last for a while. However, these days our big-city district attorneys don't seem much interested in prosecuting even violent crime, so why should the criminals worry?

And even in places where they do prosecute theft and violence, you might get jugged. 

Jugging is the delightful practice wherein the punk follows the ATM user for some distance, sometimes far from the point of cash withdrawal if by car, and when the victim is in a less secure location, helping himself to the cash. 

"The robber then follows the customer outside the establishment before taking the money from the victim or breaking into the person's vehicle, most often at a new location but sometimes outside the bank," as the Austin American-Statesman describes it. "'There, they are approached, threatened with violence, or assaulted while the suspect demands the money or aggressively takes the cash bag,' the Austin Police Department said in a statement."

So the common ATM is increasingly a hotspot for crime. But what of the more mundane, totally anodyne United States Postal Service mailbox? 

Glad you asked!

"Whether you’re sending holiday cards or gifts, or just mailing your monthly rent check, you may want to avoid using those large, blue collection boxes—at least for the next few months, United States Postal Service (USPS) officials have advised," writes Elizabeth Yuko at Lifehacker. Well, that's all right; no one sends any mail around the holidays, do they?

You'll be hard-pressed to find the relevant press releases from the USPS's own site, which has a tendency to BAD REQUEST you out of anything that isn't brand-new, but according to KY3 in Springfield, Missouri, here's the problem:

Before you drop an envelope in one of those blue boxes, United States Postal workers want you to keep a few things in mind.

USPS reported an increase in thefts from these boxes during the holiday season. Here are a few precautions to make sure your gifts are delivered.

First, look at the time of the last collection for the day on the front of the blue box. Make sure you are putting your mail in the boxes before that time. You don’t want your letters or packages sitting overnight or over holidays and weekends when thieves could target the boxes.

“One of the best things that you can do is hand it off directly to your postal carrier, obviously, then it’s already in their hands, and it’s into the system,” said United States Postal Inspector Paul Shade. “The other option would be to take it directly into the post office. And obviously, it would have to be during regular business hours, but that’s the most secure way to protect your mail.”

Yeah, well, the one time we had something stolen in transit it was a Home Depot gift card in a birthday card, and it was stolen right out of the USPS processing center in Brooklyn and used at a Home Depot in that borough before we even knew it was missing. Of course we filed a complaint, but we never heard anything -- and of course the money was gone forever. So your trusty postal worker, especially some asshat hired to help out during the busy season, may also not be so trusty. 

Still, I guess it's better than leaving anything in a secure mailbox, which is secure. Everyone knows tampering with the mail is a federal offense, and that means real trouble, right?

Ha. Yeah.

What's going on out there? We can't use ATMs, let alone the bank itself. We can't answer our doors, because burglaries are on the rise, especially in cities. Every house in America is getting security cameras, willfully pushing along a dystopian end of privacy for the fear of violence and theft. And now we can't use the friendly blue mailbox? Meanwhile, despite the cameras and guards, retail giants like Target are losing hundreds of millions because they can't stop organized shoplifting rings; no one gets arrested and no one goes to jail. (I'm no fan of Target, but this is ridiculous.)

You know, the whole rampant crime issue was supposed to be the real needle-mover on the midterm elections, and is certainly a prime issue with which most adults have been grappling. But there seems to be a lack of understanding among freshly minted idiot voters. In City Journal, John O. McGinnis writes: 

When I get together with friends, the conversation often turns to their children’s political views, which are almost always significantly more liberal than theirs. Sometimes, their children’s stances are so far to the left as to baffle them. The daughter of one friend supported prison abolition, but she could not explain to her father how this policy could possibly work in practice.

This last bit really caught my eye. I've heard the term "prison abolition" before, and when it's accompanied by the slightest attempt to suggest a replacement for imprisonment, it's a thin goo of psychological service promises and equity spending. 

We've been using psychology on criminals for over a century; we've been social-spending out the bazooty since LBJ's Great Society; and yet crime and our cities become worse. There will always be human beings who would rather steal than work; there will always be psychopaths who want to kill and destroy; there will always be sociopaths and narcissists who think they deserve whatever they can take; and there will always be people whom a decent society will have to incarcerate to protect the innocent. Attempts to reform the guilty are admirable and important, but they are a distant second to providing protection for the innocent and justice for the injured. Anyone who can't understand that has been educated beyond intelligence and into a world of pure emotional nonsense. 

In the end, there are only three ways I know of to keep bad actors away from their victims:

1) Lock them up for a period society finds fair for their crimes;

2) Butcher them and drop them in mass graves (a favorite of socialist revolutionaries, who like to throw in political opponents as well); or

3) Let the beasts run wild and force everyone else to live imprisoned behind high walls, sharp cameras, barred windows. 

Hey, kids! You're all about the fairness. Does choice #3 seem fair to you? Does it seem like equity that your grandma can't leave the house, or mail you a check from the postal box? Maybe your college professor or online influencer or favorite musician has his or her head up his or her behind? Just a thought.