Keeping Children and Teenagers Safe (and Parents Sane)

Great book sugested by a security consultant at work. Kind of scarry when you read about the risk our kids have, but good to have some ways to protect them. The author call it intuition but I call it the Gift of the Holy Ghost.

I purchased this book along with The Gift of Fear on the assumption that each would contain unique information. Unfortunately, there were whole sections (multiple pages) of self-plagiarized material, which made it feel like I'd really only purchased a book and a half. While I feel that he has an important message and that his lists of signals do bear repeating in full, his editors really should have at least required entirely new anecdotes for the new book (instead of allowing the wholesale "recycling" that took place). I recommend buying only one of these two books -- possibly this one if you are particularly interested in protecting kids.

The author does a great job of outlining proven "danger signs," encouraging people to heed their own internal impression that something is wrong. After reading the whole book, I agreed with him that really facing my fears of threats and increasing my confidence in my ability to recognize and heed the signs of threats actually helps reduce my worry. I'm not guaranteed that I can protect myself or my family from predatory people, but I'm reassured that I can do a lot more than I originally thought I could. What more can one ask?

This is an outstanding book! Though familiar with Gavin de Becker's other work, it wasn't until recently that I found this gem. I was so impressed that I have given it to numerous friends and family with children. This work should be included in the classrooms, starting in Pre-School! Childcare providers as well as parents will benifit from the wealth of knowlege and resources that this book provides. Teach your children to be safe!

So many practical and teachable common sense tips to teach my children. I've told everyone about this book.
Wish the CD wasn't so expensive. Thanks Gavin. Many thanks. My children move about with a little more smart
confidence now.

Great reading, everything in the book was well presented. I would recommend to anyone in law enfocement, executive security. I will definitely get my sons and dauhter-in-laws to read. And today I will strart reading Just 2 Seconds, really lokking forward to the read!!!

I've been teaching personal protection for 20 years.
Gavin De Becker is a profit, and this book hits the nail on the head about children's safety and all the things that we don't do right with our children (relative to their safety.)

Much of this book is composed of anecdotal information - ie, stories that the author has heard of about abuse and/or kidnapping of children. The stories are definitely insightful and interesting to read.

However, when he is not recounting a story, the author tends to ramble on with what appears to be a lot of flakey opinion and poor attempts at wit and humor. As the reader, you are largely left on your own to glean any kind of practical, well-proven advice on keeping your children safe under all the various circumstances of modern life.

Speaking of things that must be proven - one the main reasons I am giving this book such a low rating is because de Becker throws out an awful lot of statistics without giving us even a single clearly-referenced source to confirm any of them. I see that other reviewers have already mentioned this; I mention it here again because I feel strongly that someone who is apparently "America's leading expert on predicting violent behavior" (the book's words, not mine) ought to be able to cough up some sound, peer-reviewed research that he has either conducted himself or has at least gathered from reputable academic sources who have already done that work.

Example: He states multiple times in the book that "nearly 100 percent" of sexual predators are "heterosexual men". Now maybe that's true, and maybe it isn't. But either way he isn't giving us exact figures, and isn't giving us any source to follow up with.

Another one that I found odd is that in chapter 13 he claims a couple of experts found that "100 percent" of male students who commit shootings at school are "Caucasian" and live in "rural communities". 100 percent? Really? Again no proof of this; we just have to take his word for it.

De Becker appears very opposed to gun ownership. He argues that children should never be allowed even the slightest chance of obtaining unsupervised access to a gun - and on this point he and I are in full, absolute agreement.

*However*...for anyone who is elderly, disabled, and/or perhaps is just physically smaller/weaker than average, I would think there could be instances in which gun may be the only thing standing between them and a stronger/faster predator who holds no reservations about burglarizing, raping or killing you and/or your children. De Becker would probably say that having a gun-free home is worth taking this risk. In fact in the last paragraph of chapter 12, if I understand him correctly, he seems to encourage making your home a "weapons-free environment" altogether.

I respect and fully share his safety concerns about the use of weapons and guns specifically, but I cannot say that he has persuaded me to take his particular point of view on the whole.

I would like to give de Becker credit for the following:

He does a good job of describing techniques that con artists - specifically pedophiles and kidnappers - may use to manipulate children as well as parents to not only drop their guard but actually assist the pedophile/rapist in gaining unrestricted access to victims.

These types of techniques include quickly forcing favors (real or percieved) to encourage compliance, overwhelming a victim upfront with extreme friendliness, distracting/confusing a victim by providing too much information, and the like. These are strategies used not only by pedophiles but also panhandlers, salespeople, and even charities. Obviously the stakes are extremely serious when a rapist or pedophile attempts them. I have read other authors (such as Robert Cialdini) who describe these techniques in more detail and using different terminology than de Becket but regardless it was these parts of the book that I felt had the most value. Unfortunately these parts of the book are few and far between.

In summary - it is a decent book, but consider a cheap used copy or the library first.

I HIGHLY recommend this book (or any of the author's writing) for anyone, but most especially parents. I had read it years ago and bought this recent copy for my partner, who loved it as much as I did. Happy reading!

Trust your instincts. Fear can protect you and your children. Highly recommend this book as it was required reading assigned by SWAT TEAM LT. For all of his police recruits. THE GIFT OF FEAR by same author.

I can not believe how beneficial this book is for all parents to read. I learned so many new perspective and techniques to truly keep our kids safer in today's society. And best of all how to acknowledge your intuition and teach your children to do as well.

This book contains many stories of what could happen and did happen to various children and instead of informing through strategies and sample dialog, it is explicitly unnerving and serves more to scare the parent than to teach him/her.

included no tips; no sample dialogues or sensitive conversations with small children....just scary stories of gloom and doom, and women whose "gut reaction" and intuition saved their lives or those of their children (or did not and they realized that they shouldnt have made excuses and listened to their feelings). the author kept self-promoting himself and the content was stale, pathetic, and told anyone who isn't living in constant fear that they are deniers. ugh.

Parents, especially moms, and especially parents of daughters, if you never read any other book ever again, this will be the one to read before that time comes! This book is all about not only you being able to protect your children better but about teaching them to protect themselves since we cannot always be around. It talks about teaching your children to follow their gut feelings and recognize signs of danger so that they will know if and when to protect themselves. For example, "you shouldn't teach your children not to talk to strangers, because they see you do it every day. Instead, you should teach your children not to talk to anyone that seems suspicious or makes them uncomfortable in any way,etc." With this book, you can learn how to teach your children about danger without making them afraid of everything. Mothers, and maybe dads too, you should start out with reading "The Gift of Fear" which is the author's first book.

I read Gift of Fear on recommendation and loved it. The two most helpful things to me were 1. encouragement to trust my intuition and explanations of how it works and 2. specific red flags to look for and specific actions to take in being more assertive. When it came to passing this knowledge on to my young children, it suddenly all became very daunting and overwhelming again. Protecting the Gift is so helpful I literally put the book down more than once to stop and teach my child something new. Many tidbits will have to be taught over time, but you will be able to pick this book up and teach most any child at least one critical safety lesson. Examples: Find a mommy or woman when you're lost, yell/tell when told to not yell/tell, and say "Stop or I'll tell" if someone makes you uncomfortable. It's not going to work without lots of practice, and my child's safety is still 100% my responsibility. But if you are looking for a guide to teach your children proven safety measures based on statistics and reality, this is it. This would be an amazing gift for baby showers and parents with kids of any age!

This book will make you realize how ridiculous the way we teach our children to be safe is. The mantra, "Never talk to strangers," will never seem so clearly useless when you read this book. I am a teacher of young children and a parent, and I wish this book had been around when I was growing up.

Parents, Grandparents, and Relatives of children and teens of all kinds:
A few important numbers for you:

100: The % of parents who, upon telling their child "Never talk to strangers," then soon after breaks that rule in front of their child by word or action by talking to the stranger at the shoe store checkout line, encouraging their kid to "Tell the nice lady how old you are!" to a stranger taking your order at a restaurant, etc...

0: The number of times in an average household a child is praised for being defiant to an adult or for telling an adult no.

90: The % of kidnappings/sexual abuse incidents/physical abuse/etc.. that could have been prevented if parents were trained to see the signs BEFORE the abuse happened and if we changed the way society thinks about our fight-or-flight fear cues (as a God-given gift in times of real "signaled-about-by-our-instincts-danger-signs" rather than useless worry about over-exploited statistically-unlikely news stories).

50-100: the number of DIFFERENT victims a sex offender will violate before he is caught (doesn't make that sex offender registry so helpful)

3: The average age that sexual abuse begins

0: the number of times a day in an average home a child has a conversation with their parents after meeting someone new about "How did that person make you feel? What did they do that made you uncomfortable? Did they stand too close? Touch your arm too much? Give too many personal details too soon?"

1 in 3: the number of girls who will have a sexual experience with an adult (the figure is higher when you take into account the extra 20% of abusers who are teenage or adolescent boys)

1 in 6: the number of boys who will have a sexual experience with an adult (ditto to that figure being 20% higher)

Almost 0: Number of parents who teaches their child EXPLICITLY (rather than with vague statements of "You can tell me anything" or "You should tell if something makes you uncomfortable") to be careful with family friends, uncles, stepsiblings, mom's boyfriend, and the other people who are FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR more likely to kidnap, molest, or physically abuse their child than a stranger.

Almost 100%: The number of sexual predators that are heterosexual males

1: number of miles between sex offenders (most are not registered because they have not been caught)

Want to learn how to pay attention to your nature-give/God-given instincts and get rid of "stranger kidnapping my baby by offering it candy" base-less worries? Read this book:

Fascinating read! I learned so much. Now I have more tools by which to teach my young daughter how to be aware of her surroundings. Now I can also be more thoughtful to those around me as we all have different and similar stories. Snap judgements no more; now I pause for more thought. I worry less for our safety because I am teaching my daughter how to be inclusive and open to her environment rather than shuttered off. We are learning to nurture and trust our intuition. We are learning the damage denial can cause and working through our own fears as a family.