7 ms·
Just more security theatre and corrupt politicians (guess who runs the companies the scanners are bought from). The reality is that they can't keep weapons and
by rogerbinns 15y ago
Just more security theatre and corrupt politicians (guess who runs the companies the scanners are bought from).
The reality is that they can't keep weapons and drugs out of prisons where there are no freedoms, and there is plenty of time to be as invasive as you want to visitors and residents.
Additionally the security system has failed if the point you pick up the bad guys is by some low paid grunt at the airport staring at a screen. The point of airport security should be to catch occasional idiots and that is about it - something any metal detector can do.
The reality is that anyone determined can get through any security system and wreak terror. The response is to not be terrorised. It is to live well and not in fear. It is to have made their actions completely pointless.
- seanp2k2 15y ago...and instead, we freak out as a nation, flush our civil liberties down the toilet to feel "safe", and let our country fall apart in the wake of our fears. "Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." Bravo, USA, bravo. Osama is still #winning because we're still dealing with his terror of >10 years ago. Let that sink in for a bit....this is exactly what he wanted.
- davidhollander 15y agoFear is not always irrational. If we encountered a large tiger while out on a walk, it would be a very beneficial response. To discuss the pragmatics, the problem appears to be the near deterministic impossibility of shutting off the defense contracting money spigot once it has been opened. It's not a business one has the power to boycott.
- thewisedude 15y agoFor the sake of honest debate... how do you know what exactly it is Osama wanted? Maybe all he wanted was to kill people and didn't care about liberty because he does not know what it is! or he wanted to send some kind of a message to westerners or something else... we will not know. Sure, liberty seems to be lesser in airports...but connecting that to what Osama wanted is a big stretch!
- InclinedPlane 15y agoWe know what Osama wanted, he's made many public statements. He wanted the western world to stop interacting with the Muslim/arab world because he thought the west was a corrupting influence on traditional Islamic and arab values.
- CWuestefeld 15y agoSure, he's a mass murderer. But he'd never stoop to lying in a public statement.
- rooshdi 15y agoAre you really suggesting murdering hundreds of innocent people is more honorable than lying for the sake of easing people's fears? I don't respect lying either, but let's not get crazy here.
- seclorum 15y agoIts America we're talking about here, where every single US President of the last 100 years has been responsible for the mass murder of innocents...
- InclinedPlane 15y agoI get your meaning but it doesn't have much weight without any evidence. Certainly Osama has lied, and is capable of lying. But we do not automatically question the stated motives of murderers and bombers without additional evidence. We do not second guess whether abortion clinic bombers are actually anti-abortion. We do not hypothesize what the real motives of the unabomber were, we take it on face value that he opposed the advance of industry and technology etc. Similarly, we have no good cause to question Osama's stated motives. When an organization repeatedly makes clear their motives through public statements; when that organization undertakes combat operations at such great risk and cost that they employ suicide squads to carry them out and when those operations comport with their stated motives; and when their other activities also closely align with those statements why question those motives? The only reason is because someone has a political cause they wish to shore up by portraying a major political force like Al Qaeda as something it's not. For what it's worth, Osama was right. The west has been a corrupting influence on the Arab and Muslim world, eroding traditional values such as misogyny, oppressive political and social institutions, stultifying economic systems, etc. For the most part I think this has been a good development, as I value individual liberty, education based on rationality and science, the spread of industrialization and broadbased wealth, etc. But such things are roadblocks to the creation of a new caliphate, or something much like it, in the Islamic world, which is the ultimate secondary goal of groups like Al Qaeda after they have managed to isolate the Islamic world from external influences.
- nkohari 15y agoWe know. Well, a lot of us do at least. I can only choose to live my life without fear and do my best to influence others to recognize real freedom is more important than a false sense of safety.
- raganwald 15y agoAirport security is a stupid idea, it's a waste of money, and it's there for only one reason: to make white people feel safe! That's all it's for. To provide a feeling, an illusion, of safety in order to placate the middle class. Because the authorities know they can't make airplanes safe; too many people have access. You'll notice the drug smugglers don't seem to have a lot of trouble getting their little packages on board, do they?...... —George Carlin, “Airport Security"
- mc32 15y agoIsn't the psychology half the battle? You need to convince people there exists a reasonable effort to provide some sort of security --even if it's more psychological security than not. In addition, as others have pointed out it's also to filter against known (easily replicated) attacks.
- _delirium 15y agoThat fails once somebody has demonstrated an easily replicated attack that works on the current system, though...
- rogerbinns 15y ago> Isn't the psychology half the battle? That is why it is known as "security theatre". The wikipedia page is comprehensive: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater
- mc32 15y agoI mean, that psychologically, it's like a placebo. While it may or may not actually prevent anything that people believe it does is what's important. Somewhat similar to crosswalk buttons which don't actually provide jumping the change of traffic light phase queue. The term Security Theater sounds dismissive and implies there is no actual benefit. It seems in the least debatable to me.
- 15y ago
- alapshah 15y agoYes - Michael Chertoff (Head of the department of homeland security 05-09) consults (TAKES MONEY FROM) the same companies that make the scanners: http://gawker.com/5437499/why-is-michael-chertoff-so-excited-about-full+body-scanners http://gawker.com/5437499/why-is-michael-chertoff-so-excited... And lockheed (who has the backscatter contract) donates money all over the place: http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/lookup2.php?strID=C00303024 http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/lookup2.php?strID=C00303024 Follow the money, as always.
- Dove 15y agoThe response is to not be terrorised. It is to live well and not in fear. An interesting comparison is a popular Israeli song from a few years back: Yalla Ya Nasrallah (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8pVvJIzllA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8pVvJIzllA). They respond to (not merely a single act, but frequent!) terrorism with taunts, humor, and an attitude of defiance. I can imagine what a parallel song would sound like (Bring it on Osama / Blow up all the buildings you want . . . ). It would never have been written here. It would never have become popular. I see in that an indictment of the culture.
- MrMan 15y agoI completely agree. Any society that is not inextricably, geographically entwined with a mortal enemy is corrupt, degenerate, and bankrupt. Essentially, a society worse than the enemy society, and it deserves to be purged from within to regain the primal purity it once possessed.