Our local hospital officials are addressing basic issues of safety and security, and as I worked on those stories this week, it occurred to me these are issues we all should be thinking about.In Minnesota, and especially here in Rock County, we’re simply too nice and too naïve.It took a rash of home burglaries a couple years ago to get people to think about locking their homes and most still don’t. Plenty don’t even lock their cars.To be trusting isn’t a bad thing, necessarily, because it means we prefer to see the good in all people, and we want to believe no one will take advantage of us.The truth of the matter, though, is that no one who’s ever been taken advantage of that way leaves a home or vehicle unlocked.So why do the rest of us insist on waiting our turn? We assume it happens to other people — until it happens to us.Maybe that’s why urban New Yorkers think we’re dumb.They’ve been educated since youth to distrust strangers, so it’s odd for them to connect with friendly Minnesotans who, in turn, think New Yorkers are rude.I’d like to think we can keep our Minnesota Nice image, but act a lot smarter when it comes to stranger danger.It’s great that our hospital employees are on the alert for would-be harm doers. We should all be so smart.They’ve been taught if someone is looking or acting out of place, it’s their job to ask the stranger questions — for their protection and the protection of the patients.They need to risk being rude to ensure safety and security.We can take our own cues from this.If someone strange is poking around our neighborhood, we should risk being rude, and ask some questions — nicely, of course.It’s hard for Minnesotans, who have been raised to mind their own business, but I also wonder how many child abductions or other crimes could be prevented if more people were paying attention and weren’t so scared of being rude.I’m certainly not advocating that we become cynical, skeptical New York snobs, but we sure don’t want our Minnesota Nice to make us easy targets.
