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The problem with your logic is that the statistics you give are based on there being security. Without it, you have no idea how high the number of successful a

The problem with your logic is that the statistics you give are based on there being security. Without it, you have no idea how high the number of successful attacks on planes would be. The chance of dying in a auto accident is still really low. Should we start allowing drinking and driving, no air bags, no speed limits etc. because those laws are annoying to you? I, like everyone else would appreciate less restrictive security, but some level of security has to be present on aircraft. Without it, there would be far more incidents. Especially non terrorist activities like people bringing guns on board for hijackings etc. Security at airports is effective against a wide range of attacks, not just organized terrorism. (I used 2000's number of flights to estimate today's. 20M)

jamieb 15y ago
You seem like a reasonable person, so I think you just missed the key point of the article: the security theater does not increase security.
Silhouette 15y ago
You are doing what lawyers call "assuming facts not in evidence". In particular, you are assuming that without the current procedures, actual security for air travel would in fact be lower. Moreover, you are assuming that if actual security for air travel were lower, the result would be an overall increase in losses due to terrorist attack. Neither of those things is necessarily true. Firstly, the whole point of the criticism here is that there is no evidence whatsoever that the kind of security theatre we put up with (or avoid by not flying) today does improve actual security. Secondly, why would you assume that a terrorist with the resources to conduct a successful attack and the willingness to do so would be deterred just because airport security prevented them getting onto a plane? Why wouldn't they just attack another target instead: a railway station, a shopping centre, a nightclub, the queue for security at the airport? If you prevent them from killing 300 people by attacking an aircraft, but they kill 300 people by blowing themselves up in a crowded nightclub instead, you haven't saved any lives, you've just moved the problem. Your car analogy fails, by the way, for the simple reason that thousands of people die in road traffic accidents every year in my country, and laws prohibiting drinking and driving have been shown beyond any reasonable doubt to reduce that casualty rate. (Air bags and speed limits are more controversial, because the evidence that they are a net win is not so conclusive, but that's a topic for another day.)

jamieb 15y ago

You seem like a reasonable person, so I think you just missed the key point of the article: the security theater does not increase security.

Silhouette 15y ago

You are doing what lawyers call "assuming facts not in evidence". In particular, you are assuming that without the current procedures, actual security for air travel would in fact be lower. Moreover, you are assuming that if actual security for air travel were lower, the result would be an overall increase in losses due to terrorist attack. Neither of those things is necessarily true. Firstly, the whole point of the criticism here is that there is no evidence whatsoever that the kind of security theatre we put up with (or avoid by not flying) today does improve actual security. Secondly, why would you assume that a terrorist with the resources to conduct a successful attack and the willingness to do so would be deterred just because airport security prevented them getting onto a plane? Why wouldn't they just attack another target instead: a railway station, a shopping centre, a nightclub, the queue for security at the airport? If you prevent them from killing 300 people by attacking an aircraft, but they kill 300 people by blowing themselves up in a crowded nightclub instead, you haven't saved any lives, you've just moved the problem. Your car analogy fails, by the way, for the simple reason that thousands of people die in road traffic accidents every year in my country, and laws prohibiting drinking and driving have been shown beyond any reasonable doubt to reduce that casualty rate. (Air bags and speed limits are more controversial, because the evidence that they are a net win is not so conclusive, but that's a topic for another day.)