Home Security Systems: Modern Day Doormen?

A first-time visitor to New York City might be surprised by the number of apartment buildings with so-called doormen. These doormen who are in fact almost exclusively men are anachronistic to some, and a necessary part of daily existence to others. Might a complete home alarm system be your personal doorman?

While in the United States, doormen really only exist in New York, they are in fact common in larger cities around the world, whether they are called porters, watchmen, or by the variety of local names that they are given. The need for doormen and their predecessors goes back to the first days when humans began to live in walled cities and in other precursors to today's small, densely packed apartment dwellings. Watchmen certainly made sense in the days when city residents had to worry about being sacked by residents of nearby cities and possibly even sold into slavery. Doormen obviously predate the introduction of electricity into the world's big cities, which powers closed circuit television and other security system technology, but yet this ancient profession seems to have survived, and some say, thrived. In New York City, for example, doormen are unionized and make relatively high salaries in New York for what some would consider to be unskilled labor.

To outsiders, New York might seem like a strange place, and it is unabashedly unique within the United States. Doormen almost went on strike as recently as 2010, and apartment dwellers in one local newspaper article are quoted as saying that they were unsure of their ability to handle tasks such as sorting mail, screening visitors, operating elevators, and bringing luggage and takeout Chinese food to their apartments on their own without their doormen. To many people, such complaints would seem like an only in New York scenario, as the saying goes. Perhaps this has contributed to a perception of modern home alarm systems as superfluous and unnecessary, and something for people that are just not equipped to take care of themselves, much like the stereotype of the neurotic New Yorker.

However, this is not necessarily a fair comparison. When considering your security needs, one has to remember that security is somewhat of a comparative proposition meaning that your home just has to be slightly more attractive than your neighbor's to make it more of a target. In that sense, we can see the purpose of a doorman. A doorman is another pair of eyes, another person invested in the security of his or her building's residents, another helping hand available when needed. It is easy to see how a security system serves a similar purpose, with the advantage that you don't need 100 apartment dwellers to split the cost of a doorman's salary you just need to pay your (much lower) bill on time for your home monitoring system!