Asymmetric Risk Assessment

From a comment thread elsewhere:
"By the way, I'm quite serious about that Church Dinner Group. Despite all the weirdos wandering by in the alley enroute to the Youth Hall with its kitchen and other services, I don't think there was all that much danger to the Ramsey family. Despite the sometimes weirdos who engaged in busking at the Pearl Street Mall, I don't think there was all that much danger to the Ramseys.

I really do believe that the church social group which held their annual Family Circle Dinner at the home the Ramseys had so graciously volunteered was the source of their greatest exposure to risk from weirdos.

If someone wanders by in an alley and he is a dirty, obviously homeless character, he advertises his status and people do not approach him and he has learned not to approach others. There is an obvious risk and people react to it automatically. Some react excessively, some do not, but all react to the blatant message of a dirty disheveled weirdo walking along the alley talking to himself.

Its the person with higher coping skills who has a home and has a job but lacks sufficient social skills to navigate life successfully that is the most likely threat. These types tend to gravitate to church social groups because such groups are available to them and tend to be accepting of them. The threat is real and less obvious. Its that sort of a group that holds more danger than alleyway passersby or mall lingering losers."

Now ofcourse this is not to say that all church social groups oriented to young adults are simply chock full of demented weirdos who get by simply because they present an image that is more socially acceptable that some alley-traipsing schizophrenic enroute to a free meal at a youth-hall's kitchen. Its a matter of risk assessment. Of all the people the Ramseys encountered in their daily life, where is the greatest risk likely to be? The alley route to the youth hall was not really all that threatening. The buskers at the Pearl Street Mall want financial donations, not homicide victims. The mall's dance school even with its second floor observation area is not really that much of a threat. There are only two known victims of a crime who had a connection to the dance school and in each case the connection is generally viewed to be a mere coincidence. With all the students at the dance school and all the observers we would expect to see far more victims if the mall or its dance school was really that much of a threat.

Its the social groups in churches that attract those less capable and more easily frustrated by life's adversities. The attendees at such church functions do not stand out as a threat. Indeed, most of them are not a threat at all. Its a subset of the attendees who lack sufficient social skills and whose personalities are an impediment to them. These are the ones who provide an asymmetric risk profile. Most of the social group members are just young adults trying to meet other young adults in some venue other than a local watering hole or dance club. Even the subset of church function attendees who may have impaired social skills are largely not a threat to anyone. I simply view such groups as high grade ore. We might be looking for a nugget in that ore that is somewhat excessively impaired but is masked by the aura of a steady job and an acceptable appearance.