Not long ago I was trying to explain to someone that security is one of the hardest jobs in the world. The good guys are always at least one step behind and even trying to keep up is a struggle. A bad guy can use his new technique immediately and repeatably but security have to wait for new technology or create new protocols and train people up.
So, now that it is accepted that suicide bombers can get anything past security by sticking it up their bottoms what can seriously be done next to stop them. X-ray everyone? Make them wait 24 hours in captivity before they board a flight? It is bad enough now with all these ex concentration guards performing their duties on members of the public but now that they cannot readily identify these bombers even with all the snazzy new clothes removing video cameras they spent $M and quite a few months installing what hope do they have? Well, only the dozy ones I’m afraid to say. Enough to keep the public paranoid but not enough to save them.
Does this mean we can go back to the old style security we used to have where you didn’t have to wait hours or leave everything behind because you could only take on board a sip of water? For some reason I suspect not. Too many peoples careers revolve around the show that is put on purportedly for our safety. In reality it, like democracy, is a live show, theatre if you will, to give us the perception that something is being done.
I don’t have all the answers, be it smaller planes or making planes that can survive mid air explosions, but one thing I am sure of is that there is no way we can stop determined people getting explosives or weapons on board. We need to think of this another way and there are plenty of ideas out there. For example, the thought of explosives inside peoples bodies has already been shown on TV, how long did we think it would take before someone did it in real life? Yet nobody has, because in reality they can’t. There are other methods yet to be used in real life but who wants to give these nutters ideas. Give me 20 suicide bombers with brains and plenty of money, arms and explosives and I could bring this country to its knees in a few months.
So do we see yet another vast, expensive, bureaucratic, unloved and hated government initiative flushed away by reality or do we see something new, something guaranteed to solve our issues added on, at great expense, to give us another episode in our Security Theatre show? The one where we get treated like cattle for no real reason.
I think we all know the answer to that.
Security theatre
Not long ago I was trying to explain to someone that security is one of the hardest jobs in the world. The good guys are always at least one step behind and even trying to keep up is a struggle. A bad guy can use his new technique immediately and repeatably but security have to wait for new technology or create new protocols and train people up.
So, now that it is accepted that suicide bombers can get anything past security by sticking it up their bottoms what can seriously be done next to stop them. X-ray everyone? Make them wait 24 hours in captivity before they board a flight? It is bad enough now with all these ex concentration guards performing their duties on members of the public but now that they cannot readily identify these bombers even with all the snazzy new clothes removing video cameras they spent $M and quite a few months installing what hope do they have? Well, only the dozy ones I’m afraid to say. Enough to keep the public paranoid but not enough to save them.
Does this mean we can go back to the old style security we used to have where you didn’t have to wait hours or leave everything behind because you could only take on board a sip of water? For some reason I suspect not. Too many peoples careers revolve around the show that is put on purportedly for our safety. In reality it, like democracy, is a live show, theatre if you will, to give us the perception that something is being done.
I don’t have all the answers, be it smaller planes or making planes that can survive mid air explosions, but one thing I am sure of is that there is no way we can stop determined people getting explosives or weapons on board. We need to think of this another way and there are plenty of ideas out there. For example, the thought of explosives inside peoples bodies has already been shown on TV, how long did we think it would take before someone did it in real life? Yet nobody has, because in reality they can’t. There are other methods yet to be used in real life but who wants to give these nutters ideas. Give me 20 suicide bombers with brains and plenty of money, arms and explosives and I could bring this country to its knees in a few months.
So do we see yet another vast, expensive, bureaucratic, unloved and hated government initiative flushed away by reality or do we see something new, something guaranteed to solve our issues added on, at great expense, to give us another episode in our Security Theatre show? The one where we get treated like cattle for no real reason.
I think we all know the answer to that.