[ETD]

Originally Posted by Racer-X

First off, I'm not young
sorry (I'd love to be young myself) I guess I thought that your avatar was a self-portrait.

Second, as I said, normally I'm in great neighborhoods for a given client.

Let me give an example. I'm working for a mortgage broker or bank who's working on a reverse mortgage. 90% I'm in a great neighborhood, 9% scetchy and 1% of the time I'm in da hood.

The same client is literally responsible for say 30% of my companies income. Being picky about where I work and where I don't would lose me the client entirely. It's not a matter of greed, its a matter of survival for myself and my family.

Lots of careers have risks. Minimizing them is the key.

Ahh Soo. Then the solution is even simpler since you are a company man. The company can provide you with a body guard and write it off as a business expense. Also they should realize that they can be liable if something happens to one of their employees while on the job. It seems to me that the expense is trivial if it is only "1%" of your job that takes you into hostile territories especially if the revenue generated is 30% of bottom line. It seems that I am the lone voice advocating for professionals to do the work they are trained to do. Remember, next time you go in for surgery that there is a lot of experience behind that scalpel cutting you and not just that it is the sharpest and best made blade in the world. Owning a weapon for protection from the unknown is one thing (heck I own lots) but knowingly going into hostile territory undermanned and outgunned is another. I know that the marines (God bless them) on this forum are quite cognizant of this basic rule of engagement. They travel in great number in a very orchestrated manner inorder to succumb the enemy all over the world and throughout modern history. Looking from the otherside, the enemy in da hood are for the most part "battle-hardened" (they may be "cowards"?? but they are "battle-hardened cowards"). No way, a few classes can give you that experience. IMHO as someone who has to plug up the holes on the bodies and a student (albeit maybe a "C" student) of the art of war (Eastern). Last $0.02 I have before I defer to the shooters here.