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31 Things Many People View As Unsafe When Actually They Are More Than Safe
Humans are a hilarious bunch. We’ll happily snap a selfie teetering off a cliff, but hand us a yogurt that’s a day past its “best by” date and suddenly it’s a threat. Our sense of danger is just extra these days.
Think about it: microwaves are still accused of “zapping DNA”, and plenty of folks swear cracking your knuckles is a one-way ticket to arthritis. But many of these so-called threats are more bark than bite.
So, why do we treat the harmless like horror? Well, one Redditor wondered the same thing and asked, “What’s actually safe, but people still think it’s really dangerous?”
More info: Reddit
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
Flying on airplanes.
srekar-trebor replied:
If you traveled by car to the airport and made it, you already survived the most dangerous part of your trip.
LizzieBoredom 3 months ago
I'm fine with the flying part. It's the unexpected falling out of the sky I worry about.
RELATED:
#2
Eating food that’s a bit past the sell by date.
imacmadman22 replied:
Exactly. You can safely eat most expired foods with just a few exceptions. In particular anything that is dry, like beans, rice, cereals, baking mixes, etc. Leftovers are usually good if refrigerated shortly after cooking for about three to four days, after that, toss it.
The only things I will not trust are things that have been previously frozen, shellfish, fish, meat and dairy products. Those items can have serious consequences if you eat them when they are spoiled.
I smell everything because I use it and if it doesn’t smell right, it’s gone. I was a chef for thirty five years, it’s not that hard for anyone to sort out what is good and bad when it comes to food.
Smell your food when it’s good, so you have a point of reference if you think something is bad.
LizzieBoredom 3 months ago
If monkeys didn't eat expired bananas, they wouldn't get drunk, and then where would we be?
#3
MSG.
Emu1981 replied:
The only "dangerous" thing about MSG is that it contains sodium so if you are on a sodium controlled diet then you need to take MSG into account in the same way that you would table salt.
Some people love creating drama, no doubt, but it seems our imagination is particularly good at inflating danger. We don’t just notice risk, we create it. Heating up leftover pizza? Nuclear alert. Butter left out for a couple of days? Armageddon. But why do we do this?
Well, fear was designed to protect us, and honestly, it does a pretty good job. Our amygdala, the brain’s tiny drama queen, is basically an internal alarm system, flipping out at possible threats. Which makes sense if a bear interrupts your morning jog, but the same system will also freak out over chem trails.
#4
Vaccines.
BlackDante replied:
Idk man my friend's cousin's wife's coworker got the covid vaccine and the next morning he woke up dead
#5
For most people, (i.e. those without celiac), Gluten.
EvilSnack replied:
There was a comic in The New Yorker which showed to people sitting at a cafe table. One of them says, "I went gluten-free two weeks ago and already I'm fifteen percent more annoying."
#6
Talking to homeless people. Yeah, they might be looking for money, but typically they aren’t seeking to harm anyone. They’re just hungry, cold, and isolated. Give them the human decency of eye contact and acknowledgment, even if you don’t want to give them anything.
Michael Largey 3 months ago
Homeless people are usually harmless. The neighborhoods they get marginalized into often aren't.
We’re also notoriously bad at judging invisible or unfamiliar dangers. That’s why nuclear power, which is statistically safer than oil or coal, gets slapped with the “ scary” label. Meanwhile, driving, which rakes in over a million deaths a year worldwide, barely raises an eyebrow. That seems a little upside-down to me.
And here’s where it gets really interesting: risk perception . The pros say we judge danger not just with numbers, but with feelings. If something seems uncontrollable, unnatural, or mysterious, it automatically earns a spot on our personal fear list. Flying is a perfect example.
#7
Extremely sharp knives.
SlobMyKnob1 replied:
In fact, extremely sharp knives are way safer than dull knives
#8
Spiders. Like unless you bother them, you're probably good. They just wanna eat the annoying bugs and chill.
You dont look like food to them.
Lee Gilliland 3 months ago
Tarantulas are actually quite friendly. They allow you to hold them at the Smithsonian's natural history museum ( which is actually a branch of the National Zoo).
BeesEelsAndPups 3 months ago
Other way around. The zoo is a part of the larger Smithsonian organization.
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Nikole 3 months ago
I think it’s a jumping spider and is indeed very squeeeee
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Joy 3 months ago
We have to be grateful that the ones with (gulps) abdomens are tiny. Evolution could have encouraged these things to grow as big as moose. Meeces??
Kira Okah 3 months ago
Not enough oxygen in the atmosphere for them to get that big.
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MalayDragon 3 months ago
Even in Australia, the spiders won't bother you unless you bother them. Applying common sense is also a good idea. Don't pick them up you'll be fine. (I'm Australian for context)
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Ellinor she/they/elle 3 months ago
Omg I wasn't prepared for the picture and I think I actually felt my heart stop for a split second.
Child of the Stars 3 months ago
I just let the spiders do their thing. There's a little house spider that's woven a gorgeous web in the eaves above my back patio. She just minds her own business and keeps the creepy-crawlies out of my house. I also have a little lizard that has a hidey-hole in the crack between my front step and the wall. He comes and suns himself while I sit and have a smoke. I call him Larry.
SkippityBoppityBoo 3 months ago
The kinkiest thing I ever did with the book - "50 Shades of Grey" was throw it at a huge spider that was crawling up the wall next to my bed!!! If you leave them alone, they'll leave you alone 🙂 But if they get too close? Use something to gently tap near to them, they feel the vibrations in their legs and scuttle away. Some eat the nasty worse insects etc that could cause you harm so? As long as I don't wake up with one actually on my face or anything? Do your spider thing 👍🙂
Kira Okah 3 months ago (edited)
Spiders are lovely. Think there are about four in this room, two in the upstairs corridor, and five in the bathroom at last check. It's warm so the bathroom window is open, they grab things that try flying in. They can have at, they even learn and adapt to human routines, it's amazing.
Nikole 3 months ago
I just have ones with really thin legs and a tiny body in my apartment (not daddy long legs), but there’s a bigger, heftier spider who has taken up residence between the two garbage bins next to my back gate. Its web will get destroyed because of storms or garbage men moving the bins, but it always comes back. I think it’s been two weeks now. There was a big fly in its web this evening! I dread the spider not being there one day :(
Load More Replies... Verena 3 months ago
It depends on where you live. In the Netherlands you can just make an agreement with them. They stay at the ceiling, you at the floor and everything is chill. In Australia you need to discriminate on type. As my little niece explained: "Flatten first, ask questions later". Besides huntsmans. They are good pets.
BrunoVI 3 months ago
This is SO wrong. If you've ever woken up with a bug bite and don't remember battling with mosquitoes or it already looks like it's been scratched too much but you just got it, it's a spider bite. Every decent-sized Eastern American spider can bite you and leave you with a painful, nasty bite. Grass spiders, brown spiders, wolf spiders, orb spiders, funnel spiders, jumping spiders, sac spiders, carb spiders, violin spiders... and of course brown recluse spiders and black widows. (Daddy Long Legs or harvestmen are not true spiders; cellar spiders are too small.)
Kira Okah 3 months ago
A spider will only bite you in self defence. If you do get bitten by one in your sleep, you accidentally rolled onto it and it got scared.
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Mike F 3 months ago
That sentiment was not on my mind yesterday. I'm typically OK with them, you don't bother me, I won't bother you, ya know? I had to change a camera mount outside and I saw a very dense web so I figured it was either eggs or the cocoon they sometimes spin themselves into to die. I got one screw out and went to work on the other when a very large black spider popped out of the web and scurried across the screwdriver I was using. I was NOT chill with that. 😂
Zaach 3 months ago
Apparently spiders know your patterns - you only see them when you are out of your pattern
GhostlySnail (she/her) 3 months ago
For me at least it’s not really that I’m scared that they will bite me, ore that I find the way they move unsettling, they give me the
HelyerT 3 months ago
You should have seen this spider in the bath this morning omg. So ten to seven I get up for the loo I look over and I went in to girl mode. So I didn’t have a deodorant cap big enough for safe evacuation so got a shoe box and paint brush. B***h starts like come at me I dare ya lol so I’m swearing my t**s off get husband Phil up I’m like there’s a tarantula in the bath. Get it get it! I don’t know how he did as I was by spare room with hands on my eyes but he lobbed it all out the window. Holy moly it was big like babies fist big.
Trisec 3 months ago
Depends on the spider. I think the little jumping ones are kinda cool and friendly. The big webby kind with an a*s that looks like a full diaper still need to be killed with fire.
Child of the Stars 3 months ago (edited)
Generally speaking, spiders whose venom will make humans sick tend to hang out in spaces humans won't bother them. The ones that make their webs under your eaves are usually harmless to us, and they keep out the creepy-crawlies.
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Cathy Jo Baker 3 months ago
If you're in the USA, unless it's a black widow or a brown recluse, nothing to worry about.
Load More Replies... #9
Cracking your knuckles. No, it doesn’t damage the joint, it compresses an air pocket through a tight space created by the movement of your bones.
JayWantsACat 3 months ago
I took an entry physiology class in college when I wanted to go into sports medicine and when the professor had a Q&A to start the semester to get out many of the questions we had, I asked him about this and he said the same thing. And this was decades ago. Aside from the scientist(?) who has c*****d knuckles on one hand and not the other for decades and has been completely fine (at least from doing that).
Airplane travel is the safest form of transportation, yet some folks cling to the armrest like it’s their lifeline during takeoff. Why? Because they’re not in control. Compare that to driving, where you’re behind the wheel - suddenly it feels safe, even though statistically, it’s way riskier. Our brains are basically trolls.
Food fears are no different. MSG has been extensively studied and deemed safe by the FDA and other health authorities worldwide. But because it sounds like a “chemical” and carries decades of bad press, it still makes people nervous. I think we just love to freak out over fancy words.
#10
Microwaves relax, it’s heating your pizza, not your DNA lol.
LizzieBoredom 3 months ago
It's for the best that people can't fit themselves into microwaves.
#11
Letting kids play outside.
InanimateSensation replied:
I find it funny that the same people that romanticize about their childhoods being free from technology, going outside until the streetlights come on, not a care in the world, etc. are now the same parents that are worried to let their kid leave the house or make them keep a phone with a tracker. And no, the world is not "more dangerous now". There have always been crazy people.
They miss their "freedom" but force all these restrictions on their own kids.
#12
Leaving butter on the counter, unrefrigerated.
Ellinor she/they/elle 3 months ago
Well how else are you going to have butter at room temperature for baking ?
Some fears have been passed down like family heirlooms. Butter left on the counter? Perfectly fine for a few days. Cracking your knuckles? Annoying to listen to, but not harmful. Microwaves? They heat your food, not start a war against your DNA.
And yet, our brains treat all these like threats lurking in the shadows. It’s like having an overprotective parent living in your head: dramatic, loud, and not always right.
#13
Trick or treating. You hear about it every year the d***s and razor blades being “hidden” in candy. Seldomly has this occurred.
GirlFriday 3 months ago
Actually, this has occurred exactly once in the United States. Some a*shat loser poisoned his own son for the insurance money by putting cyanide in candy. He was tried, convicted, and executed for the premeditated murder of his 8 year old son.
#14
“Chem Trails”.
BadTouchUncle replied:
Yeah but they make the frogs gay. That's not nothing.
#15
There has never, ever, been a recorded instance of someone using a mobile phone at a petrol pump and there being an explosion.
Michael Largey 3 months ago
I'm surprised. People glued to their phones can usually f**k up almost anything.
But what do we do with all this fear? For starters, recognizing that fear isn’t always logical can help us relax. The more familiar and transparent something becomes, the less scary it feels.
At the end of the day, not every danger is as menacing as it looks. Sometimes it’s just our brain going full drama queen over the butter dish, or our neighbor’s obsession with banning microwaves.
So, the next time you hesitate over day-old leftovers or debate whether it’s “safe” to swim after eating, remember: your brain loves to catastrophize. The scientist? Not nearly as worried.
#17
Drag queens reading books to children
Final score:
31points
Sarah 3 months ago
Was at a Drag Storytime not too long ago with my kiddo. He loved the story, the queen reading it, and the other kids there. It was a fun and colourful time! The only thing 'dangerous' about an event like this is trying to predict if there will be bigots outside (who spew more filth from their mouths than any kid should ever hear).
#18
Sleeping in a closed room with no open windows while running an electric fan.
Many (most ?) Koreans think doing the above results in death.
My mom just about died when she found out I’d been doing this for years. Guess what, mom? I’m still alive! 😂.
#19
Paper wasps. They're incredibly docile. Every year they build a nest above my back door. Even if there's dozens of them swarming around, they won't bother you if you don't bother them.
They're fascinating creatures to observe. You can actually feed them by hand by dipping your finger in syrup, honey or anything sugary. They'll lick it right off. Five years of co-existing with them, and I have yet to get stung. Plus having their nest over the door deters burglars.
Jumping Jellyfishes 3 months ago
I don't want them building nests on my house, but I'm fine with them building them in the fence posts. They eat a lot of bugs.
#20
Swimming after eating. You won't get cramps. Ask around. Nobody has. Ever.
Uncle Panda 3 months ago (edited)
I think parents came up with this one so they could have an hour of peace and quiet after lunch.
#21
GMO foods.
britsol99 replied:
For Me, it isn’t the GMO food itself, it’s what they’ve been modified for. The majority of GMO crops are plants modified to be resistant against [pesticides] (glyphosate, dicamba). This means farmers can spray [pesticides] over their entire field, the weeds die, the crops don’t. So the crops then are tainted with the [pesticide] residue.
It’s the glyphosate that is dangerous, not the GMO crop itself.
Don't listen to me 3 months ago
And big agriculture forces farmers to use their GMO seeds which don't make new seed so the farmers have to buy new seed every year & are locked into dependency.
#22
Traveling. Don't be a moron and wear expensive watches etc and mostly you'll be fine. In fact most countries are way safer than people believe them to be.
#23
It’s perfectly safe to have some salt in your diet, especially if you are a healthy normal person. There is a strange problem for many decades where people completely cut out salt from their diet and think they need to drink a gallon of water per day, which often leads to some dilution of normal blood salt levels. Only when you have poor quality high sodium diets, hypertension, old age, or heart failure do we start restricting salt intake.
Lady Eowyn 3 months ago
I'm a 70 year old on hypertension med and don't restrict my salt intake. I don't use a lot of salt, but I'm going to use enough to get the taste
#24
Sharks
Edit: Orcas are harmless to humans too! They even like humans (when not held prisoners).
#25
Chicago.
TheRealXlokk replied:
I moved to Chicago six years ago. I've only been [ended] twice in that entire time.
Seriously, though, the worst crime I've seen here are the idiots on the road flagrantly disregarding traffic laws.
The only crime that has directly impacted me was when some Tik-Tockers were smashing eggs in an aisle at Target that I wanted to go down. Not wanting raw egg on my shoes, I skipped buying whatever it was that day.
#26
Airport scanners.
I was once at Dulles Airport and the lady in front of me demanded that she not get the full body scan. She also refused to be patted down. TSA explained it had to be one or the other. Then the lady went into a rant about how she doesn't want that radiation.
Her: Those cause cancer!
TSA: Lady, they are just radio waves..."
Her: I know what they are! I'm a physician!
I tried to look her up so I could make sure I never have her as my physician but I didn't have any luck.
#27
Australia.
flameylamey replied:
Yep. For the longest time I just assumed the whole "everything is trying to [end] you" thing was a meme and everyone understood it was just a joke, but I've since learned that some people genuinely believe it and that it's actually deterred some people from wanting to visit.
Chances are people will never even come close to seeing any of the "dangerous" things they imagine they would, especially if they're visiting Sydney or Melbourne or any of the typical tourist destinations.
Hell, I spent a large portion of my childhood exploring the local bushland around where I grew up in the far northern suburbs of Sydney, where we were basically surrounded by bushland. We'd frequently stray off the track and go climbing up around cliffs, while building forts out of sticks, running through some pretty thick vegetation etc.
I've never even seen a wild snake - and if any of the kids in the neighbourhood saw one, it would be a story they'd be talking about for weeks. My biggest fear/phobia as an Aussie kid was the possibility of getting bitten by leeches, haha.
Michael Largey 3 months ago
Even if you escape the animals, the humans will try to talk you to death.
#28
Raw eggs are mostly fine for you. It's not impossible, but you're highly unlikely to get salmonella from eating them.
The reason you shouldn't eat raw cookie dough is the raw flour (which is actually dangerous), not the raw eggs.
arthbach 3 months ago
Hold on. This contains truth, and a 'it depends'. Before you eat raw eggs, check on the salmonella rates in your own country/area. It is most definitely not the same across the world. In the UK, the rate is exceptionally low as the majority of hens are vaccinated against salmonella. However, even with these really low rates, the advice is small children, elderly people, those who are pregnant, and those with compromised immune systems should not eat raw eggs.
#29
New York City.
alwoking replied:
Yeah. I lived in NYC about 1/2 my life, and only had two issues. Once a guy tried to mug me, but I was drunk and told him to F*** off, and he did. The other time I was knocked down by a group of teens, and I thought I was being mugged, but it turned out I matched the description of someone who had just robbed one’s sister. They were very apologetic when they figured out their mistake.
#30
5g babyyyy.
thisismycleanuser replied:
All cellular signals in general are safe when you are 10’+ away from the antenna. They are putting out non-ionizing radiation that causes heating and that’s it. Kinda like a lightbulb, depending on the wattage, closer you are to the source the more likely you are to get burnt. Cellular towers and small cells are low wattage therefore safe up until very close to the antenna.
Geoffrey Scott 3 months ago
However, I DID tell my daughter and son-in-law to pass on a house they sent a picture of as it had a catenary tower (high voltage power lines) about 50 yds away. My nephew, who works for the local utility (DTE) agreed.
#31
Eating the "do not eat silica" packets you find inside packages
other than a choking hazard, they're pretty much chemically inert.
#32
Skydiving. The equipment has been pretty much the same for a good 20ish years and is as safe as can possibly be made. Total equipment failures are super rare and even then mostly due to negligence or in maybe 1 or 2 cases sabotage. The buck stops with you as your own “pilot” essentially. You are supposed to check your gear a minimum of three times according to the handbook. Altitude awareness is key and if you follow all the safety protocols it is quite literally impossible for you to get injured. Going to the right type of place if your doing a tandem jump is also super important but again if a safety minded culture exists in the place your all good.
What do you think ?
T'Mar of Vulcan 3 months ago
South Africa. Yes, we have a high crime rate. But think about it: a nation of 60 million people trying to find their way out of a racism-tainted past, complete with inequalities due to that racist past. There are places where you can walk around at night perfectly safely (pointed out to me when I visited Umhlanga and wanted to get supper after it got dark). The main thing is to take precautions. And no, there's no "white genocide". Yes, some white people have been victims of crime - but again - black people have been victims in the same proportion to their demographics. White people aren't the main characters anymore, and they (I should say 'we' but I'm not one of those nuts) will not stop whining about it.
Lyone Fein 3 months ago (edited)
The person who created this list doesn’t understand the meaning of the word “total”. Maybe the list should be called “Mostly safe”? Or “Safe until something unexpected happens”?
T'Mar of Vulcan 3 months ago
South Africa. Yes, we have a high crime rate. But think about it: a nation of 60 million people trying to find their way out of a racism-tainted past, complete with inequalities due to that racist past. There are places where you can walk around at night perfectly safely (pointed out to me when I visited Umhlanga and wanted to get supper after it got dark). The main thing is to take precautions. And no, there's no "white genocide". Yes, some white people have been victims of crime - but again - black people have been victims in the same proportion to their demographics. White people aren't the main characters anymore, and they (I should say 'we' but I'm not one of those nuts) will not stop whining about it.
Lyone Fein 3 months ago (edited)
The person who created this list doesn’t understand the meaning of the word “total”. Maybe the list should be called “Mostly safe”? Or “Safe until something unexpected happens”?
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