I never said anything about letting it dictate your lifestyle and override your convictions. Fear can be rational and it can be healthy. Like all emotions it can also be irrational and unhealthy. A healthy fear of terrorism is rational, can keep us vigilant, and prevent future tragedy.
is it rational to assume that someone is a terrorist b/c they go to the bathroom, listen to an ipod and have a tan?
It isn't inherently irrational which is the distinction I think some of you are missing. I think you meant probability. You can take the total number of flights a day, then divide that by the number of terrorist attacks and declare the threat is irrational. Sure. So I guess we really shouldn't spend any money on air travel security since we are more likely to die from a lightning strike. I think that a silly argument. You can't evaluate a decision using only probability in a vacuum. You have to evaluate risk using more than statistics. For example, if you take the number of flights terrorist have flown into buildings since air travel began and divide it by the total number of flights you get a low probability. But shouldn't you factor into your evaluation that the same group has said they would strike again? According to strict numbers, no. In fact using pure numbers you shouldn't increase security after the first incident. Think of it this way: The United States has been attacked by a foreign country once in the last what, 150 years? Probability would say there is very little chance of us being attacked (.006%) compared to getting struck by lightning (1.58% in a given year) I guess we should disband the military. No. I have already said several times (I guess you're not reading the thread but instead responding off the cuff) that the restrainer in this case came to an unreasonable and unwarranted conclusion. My point initially was that such profiling is not inherently racist. Then posters started claiming we shouldn't have any fear of terrorism on planes at all, which I find preposterous. That is where the conversation is now.
Some of the reason the things you mentioned are unlikely are because of increased security, and our military. So it isn't like it is irrational to want those things. But because we have those things it is irrational to believe we will be attacked by a foreign country in the near future, or that we will be on a hijacked plane. It is not irrational to take preventitive measuers such as airport security or a strong military to help keep us without a need to live in fear of the things you mentioned. I believe that being afraid to fly with someone because they are from the middle east is rooted in some sort of racism. I don't mean that in the racial superiority way or that the person who is scared believes that all people of a race should be deported or whatever. But the person who believes that is applying the characteristic of a few people to an entire race, and thus it is stereotyping and racist.
May I point out couple of your obvious errors here first? Statistic is strictly about data in the past, not about your prediction for the next 80 years, not even your prediction about tomorrow. Statistic is not just about sample size; however, it's based on sample size. Furthermore, when you compared the probability of getting strucked by lightening and the attack of the scale of 9/11, especially when you claimed the latter has a 1/25000 possibility, comparable sample size does matter a great deal. When the only incident you can have for a terrorist attack of the scale of 9/11, is the 9/11, in the past 100 years or more, "saying a 9/11 once every 20 years is NOT a fair model", rather an absolutely false model. Now, let's come back to your complain about the "person ridicule" and "attacking attitude". It's the nth time for me to ask you to quote me when and where I personally attacked you. I called out your illogical reasoning in your posts, including this one. Now, I am calling out the fatal mistake in your so-called statistics. If that's ridicule or attack, you can report to Clutch. It's a free board, you are free to respond to anyone or not to, though you are not obligated. Meanwhile, I am free to comment on any posts, and free to point out obvious illogical statements and made-up "statistics". Cheers.
who has "claimed we shouldnt have any fear of terrorism on planes at all"? glad to hear you agree that the fake cop was out of line.
feeling fear is okay.. whether in a car, plane, boat, tall building, etc.. the actions which are results of that fear can be stupid or irrational..
First the argument was proposed that we should use the likelyhood of an event to determine whether or not we should be concerned about it. I think the military example and your response show that you have to factor in more than numbers to make a decision. Second, we agree it is not irrational to want security but you are pulling the conclusion that these things are unlikely out of thin air. The military example was merely to show that probability should not be the only guide to decisionmaking. However, you don't have a basis to claim that current security measures make it unlikely a plane will again be the focus of terrorists (remember they could bomb it or hijack it). Plus you are neglecting to acknowledge what some earlier posters pointed out which is that some of that deterrence/security comes from passenger vigilance. It very well may be unlikely that terrorist will not again attempt an action on a plane because they feel the passengers would act to stop them. That short circuits your whole line that the fear is irrational. If anything it is a key cog in the deterrence/security you have so much faith in currently. In fact most if not all deterrence is based on fear. Your argument is circular. We don't have to be afraid because being afraid led to steps to ensure we don't have to be afraid. rac‧ism  /ˈreɪsɪzəm/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[rey-siz-uhm] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation –noun 1. a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others. Men from the Middle East have blown up buildings using airplanes and have expressed a strong sentiment that they will do so again. Is that a racist statement? I don't think so. If one is going to be vigilant for behavior that may point out a terrorist is it racist to pay attention to men who (I believe) might be from the Middle East? I don't see why. Middle Eastern men have blown up planes and have said they wanted to do so again. That isn't racism, that is fact. If I see someone I think may be a Middle Easterner and they are acting suspicious is it racist to act? Again, I don't think so. Could I be totally wrong and act on something that isn't reasonably arguable as suspicious. Sure. This guy in just about everyone's opinion did so. Was it racism? At best we don't have enough data to claim it was racism. We only have enough data to conclude it was an idiotic overreaction. Yes! Absolutely agree. That would be the claims that such fear is irrational. See FB's posts (unless he was saying we should be irrational when traveling on planes and I don't think that's what he meant ).
... and very dangerous. There was a reason why no guns were allowed on a plane. Because one bullet intentional or not, from the good guys or bad guys, can crush a plane. Now, I know there are armed air-marshalls in street clothes on every single plane. It's far more dangerous than the possibility of a potential hijack. We are at mercy of those guys' judgment. If one of them goes crazy, over-stressed, or converted to a hijacker, that gun would be fatal. Even if you have a real hijacking, are those airmarshalls going to shoot? What if they miss? What if the bullet goes through the body of terrorist and blow a hole in the plane? Certainly they are all trained professionals. But no one is perfect, each professional makes some sort of mistake in his/her career. The rest don't have a gun on a plane, those people do. So far, they have only shot one bi-polar person on the back, who was moving away from the plane.
could be. so are there air marshal's on every flight or not? and if air marshal's are instructed to watch out for people with ipods and bathroom urges why are there not more of these incidents? or is there more to the story? why would an air marshal give a fake name and why would he be told to sit back down by the flight staff?
I don't know how well trained these air marshalls are but watching all these real cop shows don't give me much confidence in the ability of these guys in not causing colateral damage, especially in a tight and crowded airplane. Most of these cops just pull their gun and shoot while turning and running away, spraying bullets everywhere.
I'm sure most of what you bring up is part of rhetorical debate but the fact that you present it, also combined with the fact that you want to preserve your anonymity by not giving any background of who you are, your "better safe than sorry" argument is relevent to the discussion. Respecting your own desire regarding anonymity I have nothing to base whether you really believe this or this is an act other than what you post.
Hayes if you apply the characteristic of a tiny minority of men from the middle east to all of them then it is racism. I am not against passenger vigilance, and that was never my premise. My premise was that somebody shouldn't be deemed more suspicious because they are from the middle east, and to presume that is irrational. If you only pay attention to people from the middle east in regards to watching for a terrorist threat it is not only racist it isn't effective. I can't conclude that it definitely was racism on that man's part. But based on what I have the man's actions were those of someone who's racism impaired his judgement.
There aren't nearly enough air marshals to be on every flight and the exact number of air marshals and when they are flying is a guarded secret for obvious reasons. I don't know what the stats are but I would guess that there are many flights that have no air marshals on them. Also from what I understand of air marshal training and tactics they aren't supposed to break cover unless there is an imminent threat to flight safety. So an unruly or suspicious passenger might not cause an air marshal to break cover until they did something that presented an imminent threat. We don't know what exactly people saw Mr. Stein doing but I'm guessing an air marshal would be trained to tell the difference between what is an innocent action that merely appears suspicious vs. something that is very likely leading to something dangerous.
Yes, if you said all men from the middle east are terrorists that might be racism (if middle eastern was a race). But if you say 'I am aware that men from the middle east are more likely to be a terrorist threat than a grandma from wisconsin,' that is not racist. It is a fact. A fact cannot be irrational by definition. No it isn't. It is a FACT that men from the middle east blew up planes and it is FACT that they've announced they will strike again. To presume that they might do it again is not irrational. It is not without reason or logic. Since they have empirically shown they will, in fact, blow up airplanes and crash into buildings, it would be irrational to declare they WON'T do so. Look, it isn't racist to say 'keep an eye out for white dude's with crew cuts parking moving trucks in front of federal buildings.' It not only isn't racist but it's probably a good idea. It is more effective at stopping a terrorist threat from middle eastern men. That is the biggest threat of terrorism for the US unless I'm missing something. There is nothing racist about it. Further, no one said anything about only paying attention to middle eastern men. This statement makes absolutely no sense. You start by saying you can't say it was racism and then state is was racism. You need to examine what constitutes racism. If you say individuals within a certain race are dangerous that is not racist. If you say all individuals of a race are dangerous then you are treading on racist ground. You are just continuing to claim it is racism when your argument doesn't meet any definition of racism. That's basically what I was thinking.
You raise some good points and yes it is a fact that Al Qaeda has threatened to hijack planes again. That said though how likely on any given flight is there going to be a member of Al Qaeda? We don't have any way to know exactly but given what we do know about Al Qaeda not very likely. Even if you consider that 4 planes were hijacked on 9/11 how many flights were in the air on that day? I'm guessing that even if you were flying on the morning of 9/11 you still had a greater likelyhood of having a car accident than being on one of the hijacked planes. Another problem is that humans, and particularly Americans, respond to things out of sensationalism. Remember a few years ago when a kid got his arm bit off by a shark? Considering how much coverage there was you would've thought you couldn't go to the beach without being bitten by a shark when statistically shark attacks on humans are very rare and probably lower than getting hit by lightning. That didn't stop a lot of hand wringing and paranoia about sharks. I view much of our security measures the same way, they're driven more in response to a public perception of lurking terrorism than the statistical probabilities of it happening and many of these things, like not bringing nail clippers, don't really increase our safety as someone determined could probably fashion far deadlier weapons from stuff available on flights already. I will say that such profiling is inherently racist since you're relying on race as a primary determinant of behavior. That doesn't mean its not wholly unwarranted but its very problematic for reasons other than it being PC. For one it produces too many false positives that degrade vigilance and for two relying on racial profiling opens up a huge blindspot. Al Qaeda while predominately Arab has shown to have members of all races. A defense primarily geared for stopping Arabs makes it much easier for a non-Arab terrorist to slip through. As I've said though while we should be aware that terrorism has happened and could happen on a plane given the probabilities it would be irrational to presume that any given flight would have a terrorist and to allow such fear to dictate behavior. I agree with you that we should be vigilant but we should also keep perspective.
Yet your examples are exactly why we cannot look at probability alone to make our determination. If we did then we wouldn't even increase security. Even using 9/11 as your sample when you compare the 4 flights with the million flights that day you get a very small probability of being on a plane with a terrorist. You have to examine more than the numbers. But I would think you would keep your eye out for a shark fin. It may end up being a dolphin but that doesn't mean you should have ignored the possibility of a shark eating your arm. You also need to keep in mind that there was plenty of data that shark attacks were increasing not static. That's another example of another factor that must be assessed. I agree you shouldn't throw a hand grenade in the water everytime you see a fish so I think we have some common ground. I disagree. I think they are driven by the impact of the act, not the probability. The impact is so horrendous that you take preventitive action even though the probability is low. The probability of an accidental nuclear missle launch is low but the security is high precisely because the impact is so horrendous, not because the probability is low. I disagree again. You are not relying on race as a primary determinate of behavior. You are using it as one variable. One based in fact. Middle Easterners blew up the WTC. Middle Easterners said they would do it again. When profiling a serial killer the starting point is that they are a middle aged white male. Is that racist? No. It is a factually based assumption. Whether or not it is easier for a non-Arab to slip through is conjecture. Robert Reid could have been Chinese (it's just an example wnes )but people still aren't going to let him set his shoes on fire! I think there is friction between these two passages. Yes, I agree we should keep it in perspective. I am not advocating banning middle eastern men from flights or having someone stand over them on flights. I am merely saying it is not irrational to keep an eye out for suspicious acting middle eastern men on airplanes because some middle eastern men have announced they are going to attack again. I honestly just can't tell what is wrong with that - if black panthers announced in the media that they were going to start blowing up bus stations, is it racist for the people to be on the lookout for suspicious acting black men at bus stations?
