almost a victim

Sometimes crimes doesn't seem real enough until it happens to you or someone close to you. We humans are positive thinkers and you know, bad things only happen to someone else. Yesterday tho, I experienced crime as an involved party.

I met up with a bunch of friends at SS2 for a mamak session and it was almost 1am when we were done. My friend and I were walking side by side towards our cars when we heard a fast approaching motorcycle from behind. He stepped to the left, me to the right. Call me paranoia or whatever but I instinctively held my bag up to my chest and leaned to the side of a car parked by the curb.

Almost as if I can predict something bad about to happen, the pillion rider gave me a hard kick on my back. My butt to be exact. Actually I was bracing myself for a serious bash on the back of my head with a helmet. Somehow at that very moment I recalled the article I read yesterday morning itself about how a girl from Johor was hit on the head from the back. Had I not been leaning so close to the car, I would definitely had fell down and injured myself.

I think what happened was those thugs wanted to snatch my bag. But when I heard them approaching I held it up with my back facing them, so they couldn’t possibly snatch it from me. In retaliation, they gave me a boot. Either that or maybe they’re just some sick assholes who like kicking girls for fun. I don’t know. But whatever the reason is, it’s malicious and their aim is to inflict harm.

I don’t know what I could have done to prevent that episode from happening in the first place. I wasn’t walking alone in some dark quiet back lane. Neither was I flashing some blinding bling-blings. I honestly don’t think there was anything I could do that would have made any difference. As ironic as this sound, I’m just grateful that they only kicked me and did not slash me with a parang or club me over my head. I don't dare to imagine what could've happened if my friend wasn't with me at that time.

An acquaintance of mine was not so lucky. She went to her boyfriend’s house and was waiting for the gate to open. In that short period of time, a guy approached her and slashed her on the arms and face. He then grabbed her bag and his accomplice came by on a motorcycle and took off. It happened so fast she did not have time to react to any of it. And she’s only one of the many women I know who are victims.

Why is crime so prevalent in our society nowadays? We hear about young girls being raped, victims of snatch thieves lying in coma, people being gunned down, and it seemed to only get more notorious and violent by the day.

Perhaps there's a flaw in our penalty system. It’s not like people are not aware of the repercussions of being caught. I think it’s because they know they can get away with it. I’m ALL FOR stricter punishment, cut off fingers or something. If crime doesn’t pay, let’s show them we mean it!

But underlying all this is perhaps a more serious social dilemma. Let's look at it this way: No child growing up aspires to be a robber or thief. I would like to believe that people turn to crime as a last resort; because they can't get a job, because they don't earn enough to feed their children. Some does it for the easy way out; they don't want to toil for wealth. I don’t think people commit crime for kicks, but I’m not entirely convinced.

You would agree that people who had spent an amount of time in prison probably can’t get a decent job and turn to crime again for a living. But you can't keep them in prison forever coz they would just be living off the tax payers' money, OUR money. So do you take them off the street or do you keep them behind bars? It's very catch-22, isn't it? Either way you look at it, they are still a burden to society.

So how did it become this way? Where did it all went wrong?

Crime, with noble intentions or not, is still a crime. What goes around comes around so I will refrain from wishing their dicks to fall off or "sang chai mou see fatt" or anything along those lines. Well, maybe God can just zap them whenever they think of committing a criminal offence.

Girls, just be careful ya. Stay alert.