Airport security, profiling and saving money.

[meus_ovatio]

The recent internet kerfluffle over body-scanners and molester-guards has raised once again the question of racial profiling. I say "internet kerfluffle" because that is exactly what it was. Internet junkies and activists worked up the froth and bubble and... and then nothing. This is because we tend to get confused between The Internets and Real

Comments

[meus_ovatio]

Pardon?

[meus_ovatio]

Of course it doesn't neccessarily mean that one advocates it. It just necessarily means that logic takes its own course, regardless of our arbitrary objections. The argument follows its own end, and heeds no silly personal objections like "Well I didn't mean that!"

[meus_ovatio]

But we're specifically not screening for terrorism. We're specifically screening for ethnicity because we can't specifically screen for terrorism. The analogy is just wrong. We are, instead, screening for having a prostate.

[meus_ovatio]

Unnecessary conclusion? What does that even mean? Oh it's a conclusion, but it isn't necessary... rofl, what a load of nonsense. The justifications are that racial profiling is effective, time-saving and money-saving. Thus, those solutions which fit effectiveness, time-saving and money-saving, are equally valid. It doesn't mean that racial profiling is invalid, it just simply means that we have to afford the same respect we afford the other.

Or just admit that we're being arbitrary, and that our position is staked only on the perceived acceptability or severity of our stance.

[meus_ovatio]

Effectiveness, time-saving, and money-saving are not the only concerns. If they were, then [info]jk_fabiani's notion of banning all people from flying would produce the best rate of return: 100% effective, 0 time spent, and $0 in cost.
It wouldn't be effective at all, since there would be no flying. If we want to remain flying, and remain flying with the cheapest, most effective and least hassle-inducing policies, we simply have to use racial profiling to prevent people from ever entering an airport.

Arbitrary how so?
In that the only objection to preventing Muslims from flying is simply a less nurtured sense of fairness than those who would otherwise oppose ethnic profiling. People are drawing lines, not out of any sense of rationality, but simply out of what they feel comfortable with doing.

[meus_ovatio]

Oh, so now you're instituting your own externalities. I thought we were concerned only with time, cost, and efficacy?
Externalities? Externalities? Externalities to the issue of flight security? Are you daft? That's not an externality. That's the very ground of the issue. Jesus H. Christ. This is the best entertainment I've had in a while! Aside from World of Warcraft I mean.

But hey, you keep feinting at all these other arguments. Like I said to another poster in another post. There are about 5 million arguments I haven't addressed.

[meus_ovatio]

You're confused. I'm talking about preventing terrorism. I'm not talking about preventing deaths.

[meus_ovatio]

No, not correct.