This is a book that I cited in my first published book 19 years ago and thought it deserved revisiting.

A number of people in the hands on end of the violence field take exception with Gavin De Becker’s Gift of Fear. Gavin is an institutionalist, who has been involved in legislation, advising corporations and otherwise practicing awareness, avoidance and de-escalation and otherwise managing violence from a systemic perspective. What he preaches at a systemic level I practice at a personal level. Fighting and physical intervention must be understood as the result of a chain of event failure: you failed to select a route; you failed to recognize trouble, you failed to avoid trouble, and here you are stepping on some state-sponsored criminal’s head and getting in trouble with the pigs and their liberal masters.

De Becker covers work place violence, domestic violence, stalking—probably his best area—and ties it together in one sleek thesis with pleasingly written illustrations and examples. His recognition of the genesis of aggression is accurate, to the point that this book could have been used to predict our current youth mob violence plague. Most importantly, he stresses that your feelings of fear, dread and apprehension are to be consulted, not dismissed, as they represent your subconscious analysis of the situation. The guy strikes me as a liberal apologist and a force in corporate and government growth, both of which I count as negatives.

That said, if you are a self-defense instructor or head of human resources at a small company, you should own this book and consult it regularly.

Most importantly, if you’re a stupid bitch, who believes that a hooded sweat shirt worn on summer day is just an avantgarde fashion statement, then you really need to read The Gift of Fear.