It has little to do with Americans being violent. It comes down to population density. The US has a ton of places without the population density for pick pocketing to be effective.
this post was submitted on 07 Jul 2025
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In São Paulo it was a little mini-assault.
You'd get shoved from behind, maybe bumped into from the side, while yet another guy is actually taking your shit. Extra credit if you're at a curb so you stumble.
Then everybody splits, your instinct is to turn around to see the guy who shoved you, by the time you've done that and realized what happened, your shit is goooone.
What are they doing in Paris that the mark has a chance to grab them? I guess if you're in a reasonably athletic pack of 4-5, but at that point surely there are easier targets?
I suppose people who don't watch American sports don't appreciate that there are many obese Americans who can still run 40 yards in six seconds and expertly smash you into the ground when they get there.
I was almost pickpocketed in Paris when I was out late at night and stupid drunk to the point I was seeing double. I had sat down on the curb because standing wasn't great. They came up behind me and crouched down without me noticing until they made their move. I instantly went into fight mode and almost stabbed them. Super dumb but I was very drunk and it was just like instinct that they were trying to steal my knife so the only option was stab them in the face with it before they could use it to stab me. As soon as I got the knife back I had the blade open and they jumped back looking terrified like I was a wild animal about to attack, which is kind of what I felt like. Super weird experience. I think they were really just grabbing what they could and happened to get my knife instead of my wallet but being a drunk American my first instinct was kill or be killed.
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In my city in the UK, there have been a lot of thefts recently where someone will grab a phone out of someone's hand and then escape on a moped or bike. Sometimes they start out on foot and hop on a vehicle, but sometimes it's a "drive by" pickpocketing, so to speak (though calling it pickpocketing feels a tad erroneous if there are no pockets involved).
In big European cities, a more subtle version of what you describe can be quite common. Like if a suspicious person bumps into you (in a manner that's fairly common in a big city), people who suspect that they have been pickpocketed may pat the pocket that their phone or wallet is in to check that things are still there. This is then observed by someone working with that first person, and they watch and wait for an opportunity to surreptitiously swoop in. When it happens, even if you immediately feel that you have been pickpocketed, it can be difficult to discern who it was.
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It is, your just not gonna find pickpockets in rural places and most people don't leave their county, let alone state so people are clueless how the world at large works. Go to any big city and you'll find pick pockets at work. Further to that, many of their tourist places are far apart and remote so less likely to find them in the same kind of places as Europe, which draws large volumes of people reliably to the sames places from all over the world.
For the record, American's don't like anything.
I grew up in New York City and now live in Boston and I've never encountered a pickpocket. I've been mugged three times and had a mentally unbalanced homeless guy punch me in the face unprovoked, but I've never been pickpocketed.
Agreed. Grew up in dense East Coast cities in the 80s and 90s, pickpocketing was not a thing that happened.
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There's no pickpocketing in the US because thieves will shoot you before taking your wallet. At that point it's murder with a motive
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Not too surprised. Living in the US, giving a shit about the safety of owned property is pretty much the only thing you can count on.
Property is more important than lives. Where else would people literally say they’d shoot someone for going on “their” land.
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Because replacing said property costs money, money they generally don’t have. Being poor in the US is a cruel hell and they don’t seem to plan on fixing it any time soon so violence it is.
Yep. Don't ever bother with de-escalation when you know no safety net will save you. You have to go all in, or you are left behind, or dead.
Not the world I like living in, but that's the world I'm currently living in. Hell, my father was robbed several times growing up, so he made sure to teach my sibling and I how to be wary and catch people in the act.
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Everyone who's had to deal with these grots: shoulda let the Americans finish the job
Thieves in the US will just pull a gun on you and turn it into a robbery. It's simply safer for them to come out of the gate with you at an obvious disadvantage.
Can you draw your weapon before they can pull their trigger? Go ahead, punk. Make my day.
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When US Americans get painted this way, it feels like a "Humans- Fuck Yeah" story. Like I'm just so used to us having our downsides highlighted that it feels special to be seen for a positive attribute
It's a bit like learning that Russian cargo ships don't get boarded by pirates because they'll just start fucking shooting.
Say what you want about Russians, but that kind of rules.
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What reaction were the French pickpockets expecting? Ope, lemme get that for ya?
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