I want to go biking in cities, but from what I’ve read most police departments simply do not give a fuck about stolen bikes. How do I make sure my bike doesn’t get stolen?
I want to go biking in cities, but from what I’ve read most police departments simply do not give a fuck about stolen bikes. How do I make sure my bike doesn’t get stolen?
You’d be surprised. Some locks can be picked very quickly, and you underestimate a bike thief’s ability to casually look like they are just messing around with their own bike while they pick the lock. Most passerbys are not paying attention / don’t care about bikes on a rack.
Of course most passer-bys don’t really give a shit. But that is true whether someone is trying to look nonchalant while they mutter “binding on two” or if they are doing a smash and grab. Except the smash and grab says “Don’t fuck with me” whereas someone holding on to a lock is how you get an owner starting to yell.
Which kind of sums up a lot of the, quite frankly nonsense, that LPL’s channel is. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy watching him pick locks (and wince during his semiannual libertarian dog whistling) but all of the “masterlock is bad, lolz” meming kind of ignores the reality. MAYBE a thief will pick a lock to sneak in the back of your house or your shed. More likely they’ll just smash a window, listen for an alarm, and then steal shit. And I know LPL knows this because of his commentary on really cool shit like the military base locks where it is very much about just having a chain of custody and being a slight deterent.
I dunno. I am always reminded of a Discovery (?) Channel show. “To stop a thief”? or some crap. Premise was former burglars run a security company. They inspect a family’s home, upgrade every lock and install a security system, and come back a few weeks later to rob them as a way to reinforce good practices. The vast majority of episodes boiled down to “Yeah. you didn’t lock the door, you dumbfucks” or “You have a giant tree right outside your daughter’s window and she left the window open”. But one episode that really stuck with me was where the family actually did follow every good practice. All doors and windows were locked, the trees were trimmed, etc. So they just crowbarred a window and got in that way.
Because Felicity and Perry Mason will pick a lock to photocopy some documents without you ever knowing the hot chick who banged you last night is actually a spy. The vast majority of thieves will just smash a window, grab what they can, and be gone long before the cops come to check on your alarm going off. And that is why “just don’t leave shit on the seats of your car” go such a long way to prevent break-ins. Because, no matter the target, it is really about getting in and out before anyone tries to stop you. And you don’t need a Covert Instruments 9000 lockpick set when you can just sparkplug a window.