Don’t Boycott a Local Business Because of One Incident [OPINION]
Bad things happen everywhere, and one bad incident does NOT necessarily make a place unsafe.
As you've no doubt already heard, there was a fatal shooting at Planet 3 Extreme Air Park on Miller Road in Flint Township over the weekend.
Like most red-blooded humans, I couldn't help but be drawn to the comments section on the social media pages of local news outlets. What are people saying? What are they thinking?
It was pretty much split down the middle, 50/50. Some people said they hope that Planet 3 will reopen, others said that they'd never go back.
May I offer a little nugget of wisdom here? I only have 37 years of experience but, in that time, I've lived in three different states in two major cities and many smaller cities, and I can tell you this - bad things happen EVERYWHERE.
One of the things I remember from growing up in Milwaukee was watching the local news every night with my parents, and the first story EVERY NIGHT was about a shooting. It's an unfortunate reality of our world and has been for a long time.
Flint Township police have commended the employees at Planet 3 for their handling of the situation, which is great to hear. A lot of people would panic in that instant and may not be able to do their job well as such, but not in this case.
I can't tell you how to parent your kids - if you don't feel safe sending your kids there after this, I get it. But let's not wage a war on a local business that's been a great outlet for our kids because of ONE incident.
When we moved here in 2014, we were so excited that there was a Chuck E. Cheese in the area and our son wanted to have his birthday party there. Needless to say, there were people who wouldn't bring their kids because of the incident that happened there in 2008.
We gave it a chance anyway and had no problems.
I think we're all interested to see what Planet 3 does in the future - if they'll reopen and, if so, what kind of security measures they'll take. One thing is for sure for me personally, though - I'm not writing them off as a place to take my kid because of ONE incident. Will I be more diligent and aware of my surroundings? Of course. But it sounds like the facility and employees did a great job in handling this, and I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.
Humans are going to continue to ruin it for the rest of us until the end of time and I'm just not ready to walk this earth being scared of everything.