[m463]

I remember reading a story by a motorcyclist who had ridden around the world. He had ridden through the most inhospitable places - some because of nature, some because of warfare.

I believe he was going through a US city and slept under a tree with his bike parked nearby, and he was woken and told it was too dangerous to do that. I thought it was Oakland, (but I might have misremembered and it was some other dangerous urban area).

[bacon_waffle]

I've spent many months cycling and walking throughout the US, mainly in the 2000s; it was striking to me to learn how scared some people are of the world around them.

I could imagine your story playing out anywhere - someone saying "it's too dangerous to do that here", doesn't actually mean much about the actual danger.

[ahelwer]

Yeah, well... my parents won't let me walk home after dark in my tiny Canadian home town because it's "too dangerous", while it is objectively two orders of magnitude less dangerous than the large American city in which I now live (and routinely walk around after dark). People exaggerate danger, I've found.