What price political correctness?

The policy is to check EVERYONE at Heathrow and other airports this morning on the back of this huge terror alert. Is this necessary? Limited security resources are spread thin and disruption is maximised. Thus there are associated financial and security risks with this policy. How necessary is this policy? At what scale does this policy becomes untenable?[still in the process of moving and only just got limited net connectivity installed, so apologies to all those I owe replies to from the past couple of weeks. will be back to normal in next couple of days]Edited by cavediver, : No reason given.

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The policy is to check EVERYONE at Heathrow and other airports this morning on the back of this huge terror alert. Is this necessary?

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So what you are saying is only to check White people like Richard Reid - who is the only british citizen I can think of who has been involved in trying to take down a plane in a such a way?

I'm just raising the issue for discussion. And Richard Reid was fairly noticable in his appearance! And of coure this is precisely how security works in normal situations. My state of dress has always dictated the probability of being stopped. My none-white friends and colleagues have always suffered far more scrutiny. It is all a case of perceived risk potential.

We recently had to sign a letter at work declaring that we as cashiers were personally responsible for any bad checks which we took.The letter declared that we were to agree to ask for EVERYONES I.D. whether or not we knew them and if they were regular customers.Perhaps this is the attitude surrounding this still unclear situation which cavediver is describing.Officials worried about liability issued a blanket policy.

This policy is necessary in order to acclimatise the population (a.k.a 'the sheep') to a state of continuous monitoring and scrutiny, naturally "for their own protection".just read some German history, circa late 1930's. If the policy's ultimate goal is our protection from terrorists then it has already become untenable, as the police just don't have the resources to fully enforce it.If, however, its purpose is the gradual introduction of blanket surveillance, then this is a realistic means of achieving it.

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"In life, you have to face that some days you'll be the pigeon and some days you'll be the statue."

If you've heard the news this morning, you'll notice just how neccessary this is.

No, I have not heard the news! Come to chat and tell me!I also agree with Legend concerning blanket surveillance....The classic fundie fear factor mentioned in Revelation is the one where everyone needs to have a mark without which they can neither buy nor sell.If the government offered to guarantee peoples safety by insisting that humans register themselves by allowing identification devices to be implanted on their person, I wonder how many would comply with such a request after a few more 9-11's happen around the world?

why what happened this morning?There was an alleged plot this morning in the UK - but we have those every six months - Ricin, Forestgate etc - what happens is they arrest someone, call it a major breakthrough on the war on verb and then six months later release everyone without charge.So you'll have to forgive the british public for being very cynical about messages coming out of the minstry of truth.Edited by CK, : No reason given.

Who, specifically, do you think they should limit their checks to? Brown skin and beards, perhaps? Are you aware that Al Queda specifically targets recently converted white muslims? That it teaches techniques for not standing out by your appearance?

Normally I wouldn't go quite this far, but Reid (John Reid, our newish Home Secretary) has made some quite scary statements over the past couple of weeks...Edited by AdminPhat, : fixed quotes

We even now have our own terrormeter - it's clearly at FEARTERROR 1.

Of course, but the numbers of such are tiny - the idea of a group acting in concert is hopefully fairly implausible, though of course this could change - and with *limited resources* do you equally target mothers, famililes, etc? The innocuous (i.e. not the shoebomber) white terrorist acting on the small scale is virtually unstoppable without sacrificing western infrastructure (as we are today)

The white terrorist is no more or less stoppable than the Arab terrorist unless you decide to hamstring yourself by adopting racial profiling (while alienating the vast majority of entirely peaceful, law-abiding Arabs as a free bonus).

It is all to do with perceived risk. With unlimited resources there would not be a problem. As someone who drove a white van around NI upon occasion I have seen it in action all before... I think we're pretty much there already[abe] and the entirely peaceful, law-abiding white van drivers of Omagh were alienated and thoroughly pissed off long agoEdited by cavediver, : No reason given.

In the US we have responded very effectively to the threat you guys so efficiently uncovered. We immediately stopped all boardings on all flights and made everyone line up and throw away any bottles of handlotion or mouthwase or soda that they had.No more carry on cosmetics or soft drinks to threaten the world.Oh, and we are also sending some Air Marshalls to make you guys feel safer too. But there was also Good News. from here

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion