4 ms·

As far as I'm concerned, all of this airport security--the cameras, the questions, the screenings, the searches--is just one more way of reducing your liberty a

As far as I'm concerned, all of this airport security--the cameras, the questions, the screenings, the searches--is just one more way of reducing your liberty and reminding you that they can fuck with you anytime they want. Because that's the way Americans are now. They're willing to trade away a little of their freedom in exchange for the feeling---the illusion---of security. -- George Carlin (who said that before the TSA, before watchlists and no-fly lists) By the way, are the ports still wide open? They sure were for years after 9/11, and I guess that nobody smuggled in a container of nukes was mostly because nobody cared to do that. Kinda like why the big guy in the supermarket queue doesn't just start bashing everyone to death with the cash register, even though they could. Human decency prevents terrorism for the most part, not security. The actual good you could do with the TSA budget, bleh. New scanners just make that worse. So now the rapist is using your money to buy condoms. I admit that is better than non-protected rape. But other than that...

616c 13y ago
Your point is valid. I was told by a high school admissions counselor, back when such topics were interesting enough to consider counter-terrorism and terrorism research interesting (thank God I saw the light and chose different interests over time) that the graduate of my high school who went to one of the most prestigious schools in that field (St. Andrews in Scotland, if you can believe; lots of weirdos in the CT scene graduated from there because professors are field policy guys with more war stories and connections than common sense) had interesting experiences. He ended up doing CT for the state of Illinois. His greatest concern, as told to me, was water systems. There is terribly security at water reservoirs and water utility systems, worse than nuclear powerplants and other sensitive infrastructure. The simulations they did with predicting terrorists poisoning water supplies made him lose sleep, regularly, and he was one guy in one of fifty states who was paid to focus on such things, because he, not others felt it was a priority. At the end of the day physical and digital security are similar: no network can be 100% secure and everything is mitigation, so is living in the real world. Terrorism can be stopped and not mitigated. People who believe the opposite are the assholes who sold out and are selling out what little is left.
rayiner 13y ago
> I guess that nobody smuggled in a container of nukes was mostly because nobody cared to do that. Kinda like why the big guy in the supermarket queue doesn't just start bashing everyone to death with the cash register, even though they could. Human decency only goes so far. A non-trivial portion of the population are fucks. But in civilized society, even the fucks know that they can't take on the whole crowd, and they know that justice will be swift, which is why they stay in line. But the promise of swift justice does not exist everywhere, and "human decency" only does so much. When I lived in Bangladesh, we lived in a walled compound (iron gate, high concrete walls with broken glass embedded on top), in a nice neighborhood in the capital city of Dhaka. One night we had an entire bus full of thieves show up at the gate demanding to be let in. It took the police almost an hour to show up, during which time the thieves threatened to run the bus through the gate. The difference between the U.S. and Bangladesh is not that the former does not have indecent people. It's that in the former, such brazen lawlessness would have been met by a SWAT team, while in the latter a few cops showed up when they felt like it. Also, ask Israel how well the whole "human decency" thing is going for them.
- PavlovsCat 13y ago
  One night we had an entire bus full of thieves show up at the gate demanding to be let in. It took the police almost an hour to show up, during which time the thieves threatened to run the bus through the gate. One night, at Orwell camp, some bankers lost some bottle caps up their asses. They said they needed 700 new bottle caps or they would die, though that number was "not based on a particular data point", just really a big number, because they like bottlecaps. It then turned out they wan^H^H^Hneeded more, so they got more. Or hey, the time the magician came along, and turned a huge surplus into a crippling deficit.. you should have seen their faces, joy and awe everywhere. He also showed them a magic stone which kept them from being raped by Saddam Hussein that night. Great guy, great with kids. You were saying? Sorry I lost track there, it was a really fun camp. I wish we could go there again some day, but I guess for that to happen we'd have to at least step out for a minute first. Also, ask Israel how well the whole "human decency" thing is going for them. The state, or some of the people in it? http://www.israelovesiran.com/ http://www.israelovesiran.com/ Why don't you ask illegal colonists how being jerky pants makes it harder for the awesome Israelis than it would be already? I don't deny you have a point that the crowd keeps bad apples in check. I even agree with the monopoly on physical power. But this ran out of any resemblance to what it should be a long time ago. We (I say "we", because to me it goes without saying that anyone blinded by privilege is temporarily not of age of consent) give up our power and voice, it gets centralized, and used for the thieves you mentioned. What little security we have becomes more and more "what is necessary to keep the bigger racket running". It's not that we're not steeped in crime, it's just that those criminals don't like challengers. That it's not as bad as it could is because cops and soldiers are people, too, quite a lot of them very decent and brave ones, and because they sometimes get put in check by the populace. p.s. I voted you back up because I think you're free to disagree, especially the polite way you did (wtf people, really? cut it out!).

616c 13y ago

Your point is valid. I was told by a high school admissions counselor, back when such topics were interesting enough to consider counter-terrorism and terrorism research interesting (thank God I saw the light and chose different interests over time) that the graduate of my high school who went to one of the most prestigious schools in that field (St. Andrews in Scotland, if you can believe; lots of weirdos in the CT scene graduated from there because professors are field policy guys with more war stories and connections than common sense) had interesting experiences. He ended up doing CT for the state of Illinois. His greatest concern, as told to me, was water systems. There is terribly security at water reservoirs and water utility systems, worse than nuclear powerplants and other sensitive infrastructure. The simulations they did with predicting terrorists poisoning water supplies made him lose sleep, regularly, and he was one guy in one of fifty states who was paid to focus on such things, because he, not others felt it was a priority. At the end of the day physical and digital security are similar: no network can be 100% secure and everything is mitigation, so is living in the real world. Terrorism can be stopped and not mitigated. People who believe the opposite are the assholes who sold out and are selling out what little is left.

rayiner 13y ago

> I guess that nobody smuggled in a container of nukes was mostly because nobody cared to do that. Kinda like why the big guy in the supermarket queue doesn't just start bashing everyone to death with the cash register, even though they could. Human decency only goes so far. A non-trivial portion of the population are fucks. But in civilized society, even the fucks know that they can't take on the whole crowd, and they know that justice will be swift, which is why they stay in line. But the promise of swift justice does not exist everywhere, and "human decency" only does so much. When I lived in Bangladesh, we lived in a walled compound (iron gate, high concrete walls with broken glass embedded on top), in a nice neighborhood in the capital city of Dhaka. One night we had an entire bus full of thieves show up at the gate demanding to be let in. It took the police almost an hour to show up, during which time the thieves threatened to run the bus through the gate. The difference between the U.S. and Bangladesh is not that the former does not have indecent people. It's that in the former, such brazen lawlessness would have been met by a SWAT team, while in the latter a few cops showed up when they felt like it. Also, ask Israel how well the whole "human decency" thing is going for them.

PavlovsCat 13y ago
One night we had an entire bus full of thieves show up at the gate demanding to be let in. It took the police almost an hour to show up, during which time the thieves threatened to run the bus through the gate. One night, at Orwell camp, some bankers lost some bottle caps up their asses. They said they needed 700 new bottle caps or they would die, though that number was "not based on a particular data point", just really a big number, because they like bottlecaps. It then turned out they wan^H^H^Hneeded more, so they got more. Or hey, the time the magician came along, and turned a huge surplus into a crippling deficit.. you should have seen their faces, joy and awe everywhere. He also showed them a magic stone which kept them from being raped by Saddam Hussein that night. Great guy, great with kids. You were saying? Sorry I lost track there, it was a really fun camp. I wish we could go there again some day, but I guess for that to happen we'd have to at least step out for a minute first. Also, ask Israel how well the whole "human decency" thing is going for them. The state, or some of the people in it? http://www.israelovesiran.com/ http://www.israelovesiran.com/ Why don't you ask illegal colonists how being jerky pants makes it harder for the awesome Israelis than it would be already? I don't deny you have a point that the crowd keeps bad apples in check. I even agree with the monopoly on physical power. But this ran out of any resemblance to what it should be a long time ago. We (I say "we", because to me it goes without saying that anyone blinded by privilege is temporarily not of age of consent) give up our power and voice, it gets centralized, and used for the thieves you mentioned. What little security we have becomes more and more "what is necessary to keep the bigger racket running". It's not that we're not steeped in crime, it's just that those criminals don't like challengers. That it's not as bad as it could is because cops and soldiers are people, too, quite a lot of them very decent and brave ones, and because they sometimes get put in check by the populace. p.s. I voted you back up because I think you're free to disagree, especially the polite way you did (wtf people, really? cut it out!).