How Do You Like Your Bear Grylled?

Risk is a funny thing. People will take risks in one way and yet cringe from taking them in others. It is popular for people engaged in so-called risky activities to compare it with some mundane task like crossing the road and pointing out how statistically safer arm wrestling an octopus is. This is probably true but plenty of people do cross the street, dodging whizzing cars, thundering trucks and crazed cyclists as they do so. It is unlikely that many of these people think of themselves as risk takers. Despite this I, for one, would pay to see Bear Grylls dropped in the middle of New York City and simply told to walk an exact straight line to another point. Assuming he survived he'd be in a nursing home for the rest of his days.

To a great extent the measure of risk depends on what you're used to. Familiarity may not necessarily breed contempt but it does breed a certain measure of acceptance. The risk you know doesn't quite have the same jar to the sensibilities as the risk you don't meet everyday. Russian roulette, for example, is statistically a low risk hobby. There is only a 16.6% chance of something bad happening to you. Bear Grylls is almost certainly at more risk on his jaunt across New York City. However placing a revolver to your temple and pulling the trigger is so far outside most people's normal experience that the risk factor is inflated in their minds. Just off topic for a moment, doesn't Bear Grylls sound like a dodgy barbecue restaurant? Eating at Bear Grylls is possibly another risky activity.

During the course of a spectacularly peaceful, risk averse and largely uneventful life I have managed to go sky diving, bungee jumping, white water rafting and on one occasion I chased a sloth bear across the countryside. None of these struck me as particularly dangerous at the time (although the sloth bear incident does in retrospect) yet I go queasy at the thought of approaching the edge of a building or cliff. Even a well fenced lookout makes me feel uncomfortable yet I have abseiled into sinkholes to go caving (the trick here is sinkholes are dark so you can't see anything even if you do inadvertently open your eyes). This stuff didn't strike me as particularly dangerous but if I had been killed as a result of it people would have nodded wisely and written it off as the result of a dangerous lifestyle. If I had been killed by a car while crossing the road people would look on it as an unexpected tragedy. At least I hope they would.