hehe, tear-rists r' dumb

I’ve made the argument on this site and elsewhere that TSA frivolities, such as forcing passengers to remover their shoes, are inherently racist policies.  And I’m not talking about the overt racism involved in passenger profiling, but rather the pervasive belief that terrorists – i.e. ‘brown people’ – have the mental faculties of split-pea soup.  Because only a green, semi-viscous goo would lack the creativity to hide explosives somewhere else like, say, their rectum. 

Well, Bruce Schneier has posted an excellent article today pointing out that maybe I am taking the wrong perspective.  If the government and the media seem convinced that every inept and implausible plot by wannabe terrorists presents represents a narrowly-averted catastrophe, maybe terrorists are, in fact, quite stupid [1].  Of course, if this is the case, then what are we afraid of?

Comments

Michael (not verified)Mon, 2007-06-18 01:45

Re: hehe, tear-rists r' dumb

Very insightful article. One big reason that the news people love to exaggerate the threat has more to do with economics than ideology. Stories that everything is under control and working properly rarely sell papers. They do the same thing with reporting the weather -- somehow the storm or the snowfall is never as bad as they predict.