When I am at home and awake the door is almost always unlocked, even when I go downstairs to the basement of the apartment building to do laundry or out the back to throw out trash, it is usually unlocked. When I am out or sleeping it is always locked. I live downtown in a city of about 900,000 people and I really don’t worry about burglary - but I do worry about the drunks who move into the tool shed beside my apartment building.
Living in small towns and in the country, we didn’t always lock our doors when I was growing up, but I suppose that is a very rural mindset.
I think your friend is forgetting the part from BfC where Michael Moore asks several Canadians if they’ve ever been burgled after leaving their doors unlocked when they leave.
I’m in an apartment in a Montreal suburb. The door is usually unlocked while we’re home, and we lock it when we leave, and at night. The door downstairs locks automatically, and we know our building neighbors pretty well, so we’re decently safe. When I’m here all alone, though, I usually do lock the door, just because I’m paranoid.
I live in Bellevue, Washington state, not all that far from Canada. I never lock my front door. I only ever carry a car key, never a house key. I have lived here for 13 years. I have never been burgled, nor do I know anyone who has been burgled.
Being the cynic that I am, when I watched Moore’s film, my very first thought was how many houses did he try that were locked and therefore got edited out so he could “prove his point?” Honestly, if one were gullible enough, one would think that every freakin’ door in Canada is unlatched.
As an aside, of the homes that were unlocked, when Moore just walked in, how many homeowners did you reckon said to Moore, “What the fck are you doing? Get the fck out of my house!” I bet those reactions were also conveniently edited out.
Are we talking locking doors when home, or locking doors when going out? I don’t know anybody who locks the door when they’re home. On the other hand, I don’t know anybody who doesn’t lock the door when they go out.
Okay, I do know some people. As mentioned numerous times, I know some rural folk who don’t lock their doors when they go out.
But yeah, I didn’t really get Moore’s point in that scene. Of course the doors are unlocked - everybody’s home
Brit who regularly leaves his door unlocked chiming in…
Not all of Britain lives under lock & key. In two decades, I’ve only ever heard of one attempted burglary around here. And I’d feel strange locking the door while I’m at home during the day.
Many Americans (maybe even most) lock their doors when they are home, too. I was quite surprised to poll my friends in Windsor and learn that they don’t lock the doors when they are home. A Canadian in BfC says something about “feeling locked in” whereas I see it as “locking bad guys out.”
I live in the US and I don’t lock my doors – not when I’m home (which is most of the time), nor when I’m out, usually. I sometimes remember to lock it at night but not always. My husband does lock up at night when he’s home. In my case it’s simple carelessness, but I don’t recall there ever being a break-in in any neighborhood I’ve ever lived in.
My parents (also Americans) lock their door at night (it drives my dad crazy that I don’t – when Kevin is gone, Dad often calls at night to remind me to lock up), and when they’re out; but never when they are home. I wouldn’t want to be responsible for what my dad would do if Michael Moore just walked into his house. Mike is lucky he didn’t get his ass kicked – my dad is nearing 70, but I’d still bet he could ‘take’ Michael Moore.
When I lived in Vancouver, I locked my apartment doors all the time. It’d be damn unlikely that anyone would break into my place (even though property crime in that city is unusually high), but twice people broke into the building’s bike locker-- one time ripping off my wife’s headlight.
In Montreal suburbs, my parents and my in-laws never lock the door except when they go out, and even then they often forget. Living in Manhattan, the only reason my door locks when I’m home is because it happens automatically.
We lock our doors at all times, unless we’re doing work in the garden and going in and out of the back door. We used to be less conscientious about locking up, but our (locked) house was broken into and burglarized one time (15 years ago?), and that changed our attitude about locking the doors.
We’re talking about locking doors when going out. The responses so far tend to suggest that Canada isn’t dissimilar to the UK in door locking behaviour
I was brought up in Swansea and our doors were never locked in the daytime if we were in. The front door was left open -and ajar- but locked at night and if we were out. The back door was never locked. When I left home I fitted a lock to the back door and convinced my mother to lock it at night (she always said she did anyway).
In my present house my front door locks automatically, and I’m happy about that having had an attemped burglary a few years ago.
When I lived in downtown Toronto, the doors were always locked except when we were going through them. Or, perhaps, they might be unlocked if we were out in the yard.
When I moved to an apartment in a more crime-ridden suburb of Toronto, the door was always–and I mean always–locked. Whether I was in the apartment or just going forty feet down the hall to the garbage chute, it was always locked.
Interestingly, I did have a few people try to break in when I was at home in that apartment. Good thing the door was locked.
I lived in Nanaimo, Victoria and Vancouver. The doors were always locked when we were out or at night. Sometimes they’d be locked while we were home depending on the area where we were living.
I now live in a wee town in Washington state and while we tend to lock the door when at home, we sometimes leave it unlocked when we go into town to run some errands. The only time we take more care in locking the door is when the workers come into the orchards during the picking seasons. Every so often we wake up to see a bunch camped in our yard which will make me nervous.
In country areas I sometimes lock my door at night or when out – not always.
Most Canadians I know probably lock their doors at night. I wonder how many doors Moore tried to get the examples in his film. I found that point somewhat confusing – crime rates in Canada are lower than the US, but it’s not like crime isn;t a problem in many places.
Exactly. Da Bronx has a relatively high murder rate, for example (it’s gone down a lot in recent years along with the city’s), but in my neighborhood–relatively isolated by a cemetery, highway, park, and the city line–we’ve had one in 24 years (guy fought with his uncle over money and killed him, not something that will keep the average person looking over his shoulder walking down the street.) * So you can’t really generalize. There’s parts of the Bronx that are tons nicer than some parts of Halifax.
My great-aunts still live in rural Nova Scotia and they kept the front door locked but the back door open except when the last of them went to bed–she’d put out the wood-burning stove and lock the back door too. To be fair, they almost never used the front door at all, and didn’t want it blown open or the cats to get out.
I must we always lock our doors while home or out because, while violent crime is very rare around here, burglary ain’t. I also locked my doors in Boston for the same reason.
I lived in Edmonton all my life (except for a short time in Calgary), and I pretty much always lock the door. I always lock it when I go out, and probably 99% of the time when I’m home. Exceptions may be in the summertime when I’m in the back yard - then I’d lock the front door, and leave the back door unlocked.
Montreal here, in a residental neighborhood close to downtown.
My parents’ house has an auto-lock, so no worries there.
I lock my apartment when I go out, except if I’m just popping next door to check on laundry. When I’m home alone I lock the door, but when my boyfriend is around, I don’t really care and he often leaves the door unlocked.
