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Fear Detector To Sniff Out Terrorists
Hugh Pickens writes "Evidence that the smell of fear is real was uncovered by US scientists last year who studied the underarm secretions of 20 terrified novice skydivers and found that people appear to respond unconsciously to the sweat smell of a frightened person. Now the Telegraph reports that researchers hope a 'fear detector' will make it possible to identify individuals at check points who are up to no good. 'The challenge lies in the characterization and identification of the specific chemical that gives away the signature of human fear, especially the fear in relation to criminal acts,' says Professor Tong Tun at City University London, who leads the team developing security sensor systems that can detect the human fear pheromone. The project will look at potential obstacles to the device, such as the effects of perfume and the variances in pheromone production and if the initial 18-month feasibility study is successful, the first detectors could be developed in the next two to three years. 'I do not see any particular reason why similar sensor techniques cannot be expanded to identify human smells by race, age or gender to build a profile of a criminal during or after an incident,' Tong added."
... or people who are afraid of being suspected of terrorism
What if the fear they detect in you is the fear of missing your flight while you're held up trying to convince security that you aren't a threat?
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Luckily airports are only ever full of relaxed, calm people who have no fear of flying whatsoever.
And being dragged off to be interrogated as a terrorist in some darkened back-room by three of four rent-a-thugs can only serve to ease their fears of flying...
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
If you have a true religious fanatic, who is looking forward to dying for a cause he believes in -- and is looking forward to eternity in the paradise-of-his-choice for his actions, would he* still show physiological signs of fear?
* (I think statistically, "he" is a fair generalization here.)
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
Or fear of bad airline food? Or fear of having a screaming kid on board? Or fear of being stuck next to a passenger with hygiene issues?
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
People that are afraid of flying (or more accurately, crashing) will not need to worry about being picked out of the line for 'smelling suspiscious'! Not at all...
Posting obviously for anonymous reasons.
So the Stasi were on to something when they collected the smells of thousands of people...
You'll also get the whole set of seats to yourself.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
"The only thing we have to fear is-fear itself".
I'd be more alarmed to find someone who wasn't afraid to pass a checkpoint like this. How can you defend yourself from the allegation of some machine saying that you exhibit fear, and therefore is a terrorist? Furthermore, sociopaths and psychopaths will have little trouble passing these checkpoints.
So you'll get plenty of false positives, and plenty of false negatives.
GAAH! MY PRINTER IS ON FIRE!!! PUT IT OUT! PUT IT OUT!
Now the Telegraph reports that researchers hope a 'fear detector'' will make it possible to identify individuals at check points who are up to no good.
What about us law abiding citizens who are only afraid that our governments checkpoint workers are up to no good?
It is already a very real possibility for one of those people to make up any type of claim they want and detail you without letting you speak to a lawyer nor involve any courts.
The reason given can be as ridiculous as 'He had terrorist looking hair' and still be valid. Plenty of legit reason to be afraid of those people.
Not to mention the fact I have no doubt at least a subset of these checkpoints will be at places where fear is natural (IE airports, fear of flying, or fear of falling out of the sky in a fireball)
Will deodorant and perfume be classified as a terrorist munition now?
The idea that there's a special chemical signal for "fear in relation to criminal acts" seems to come out of absolutely nowhere. Shouldn't there be some research into whether such a chemical signal exists before device development occurs? If it's not a magic detector of latent emotion or the cause of emotion so I'm not sure how much better it would be than noticing which people "look a bit afraid". It's going to be just as susceptible to picking up people who find flying difficult or are worried about being falsely accused of being a terrorist because they look funny.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
"And in the news today, hundreds of teenage boys were arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. They were later released after it turned out they were simply wearing Axe deodorant"
Summation 2
They decided people weren't taking FDR's warning seriously enough so they'd give us a damn good reason to fear fear itself.
Do scientist have nothing better to do nowadays. Fear is an emotiona that could be the result of hundreds of different causes. Fear from stress, fear of losing money, fear of an individual, fear of going to an intervew etc, etc. How do these scientist aim to differentiate fear of criminal activity from other causes. Waste of time.
Smell like you're up to something!
Seriously though I wonder if it will be able to resolve the difference between somebody who is simply nervous and somebody harboring nefarious intentions. How many times have you wondered if the detectors would sense something (anything) on your person as you pass through them. Same with the Random Breath Test - you know you haven't had a drink in a while, but you think back to what you've had to eat/drink for the day ;)
I guess it would be easy to test though; set up some groups, give one an item which "is" illegal, give one an item which "shouldn't" be illegal. See whether or not the device can differentiate between both groups.
after being pulled over by a cop.
Yeah, this will work. Suddenly we will have lots of suspicious people locked up and their items confiscated all because they are presumed guilty for simply being afraid or worried.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
1. Get a degree in chemistry
2. Create artificial "fear hormone"
3. Bottle hormone in spray-flask
4. Spray "on your car" outside airport (and wash car with a piece of cloth) - make sure to spray passers-by
5. ???
6. Profit!!!!
--The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
Great, just what we need, more profiling in place of real security. And just how is this supposed to work with psychopaths who do not experience the emotion of fear?
As soon as this becomes the norm people will just have to run through fearless tests/scenarios just as an astronaut has to not puke in a zero gravity environment. It's just another hurdle and we'll likely ignore telltale signs in favor of machines but this is definitely an interesting advancement. It should stop the rogue unprepared school shooting type person.
smell-crime. way overdue.
1: Develop System to detect when someone is "afraid"
2: Let citizens know that those who are "afraid" will be detected, detained and questioned for "citizen safety".
3: Citizens are now afraid to go through on the idea that maybe they will somehow set off the alarm.
Tons of false positives. After the first story of a false positive, some people become afraid of being a false positive as well. As more and more stories of false positives arise, more and more people become afraid and become more false positives.
The /. quote right now...
Everybody has something to conceal. -- Humphrey Bogart
Detect terrorists, that is.
Not while there are anti-anxiety drugs out there.
What you will detect is a bunch of false positives that will keep you busy "detecting" while trucks loaded with bags of ammonium-nitrate explosive merrily (but calmly) pass you by.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Isn't this a step towards thought crime?
"He's scared, arrest him!"
The officers would only pull Arab-looking dudes, and many of those dudes might produce fear signals not because of terrorism, but because they're afraid of being treated badly at US airports like many of their brethren are.
... fear is the mind killer, fear is the little death that brings airport security...
Well, The more angles they have on detecting terrorism is not a bad thing. With all IDs requiring the recipient not to smile to prevent facial technology failures, I would expect that terrorist would just smile like crazy at places they intend on doing harm.
This will fail. A dedicated terrorist has no fear, while a law-abiding citizen can now be in fear of being accused of what is essentially thought-crime.
"Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire." -- William Butler Yeats
... a lot of people who are afraid of their boss, or authority figures in general, or airplanes, or ...
-Uberhund
I have been suffering on anxiety disorder now for the last 15 years, does that mean I will get an anal search every time I cross the border now?
I really like the idea! Preferably it should be combined with US patent 6970105 (Passenger control system during a plane flying) http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6970105.html
So we fit all passengers with large collars containing big needles with sedatives. At the first smell of fear we inject a propper dose of sedatives in their necks. The problems with terrorism and fear of flying solved at the same time.
I really must run and patent this idea right now... And get the movie rights!
This whole idea doesn't pass the smell test.
But it COULD lead to the entire population of New Jersey, the armpit of America, being banned from flying. Not having to sit next to them might be seen as a win.
Smellcrime? (Or would that be stinkcrime to rhyme with thinkcrime?)
... we could probably sell it to the Iraqi army.
This device could be useful in business negotiations. If you could smell the fear of the inept decision maker, perhaps you could use his fear of failure to buy a worthless device. It seems to work in Iraq where the Iraqi police are buying bomb seeking divining rods for as much as $60k each from a British company named, ATSC.
Mad Bomb Sniffer Story
While I think the "smell out terrorists" idea is absurd and deserves no further discussion, smell-profiling itself may prove to be a valid idea. And as often all the *other* uses of such technology may have a real impact. Drug use, gender, emotional state, age etc. being detected by some smell detectors opens new fields in surveillance and control. And I'm not sure I like that at all.
And if you look at how dogs can follow and search people by their individual smell I see no real reason why "smell fingerprinting" shouldn't work.
False positives will kill this. Plus, anything that can be measured can be trained for (see, e.g., "lie" detectors).
But, this will be good for some research grants, and maybe even an expensive pilot project, so if you believe that the best security metric is the amount of money wasted, it's all for the good.
Combined with Bomb Detecting Dowser Rods, what could possibly go wrong?
Lemon curry???
The article had a dead link to a conf presentation.
pubmed search of author Lilianne Mujica-Parodi got nothing
her web site does have a data free page http://lsec.bme.stonybrook.edu/Site/Alarm_Pheromones.html
I'm curious if certain psychiatric drugs would mitigate this effect. My friend takes valium before he flies, I would imagine that a benzo or even paxil would have a similar "masking" effect.
I've also heard that paxil can turn a small segment of the population into cannibals if pumped into the atmosphere.
Time to lose my Karma I guess... A terrorist is going to be a LOT more afraid of getting on that plane and detonating a bomb on it, and possibly getting caught by security, than an average person is going to be afraid of flying or that his mom my discover his porn, or whatever other funny reasons you guys can come up with... Second, even if there are false positives, I think that's expected by the scientists, nothing is 100%, but if you can increase your odds of picking up a terrorist by some odd percent, and decrease false positives (because terrorists are a LOT more afraid I would think) then you have saved money, saved everyone's time, and increased safety. As far as pranksters with bio-chem degrees, well, when this thing starts picking up a lot of false positives, those pranksters will probably be caught and we won't see much of that. (i.e. all the fear scent 'sprayed' people say they were all in parking lot B, then the security checks the cameras, and finds the car that sprayed them and those idiots get arrested.) I think we should at least give it a chance before condemning the idea with condescending knee-jerkiness.
"...I think the Microsoft hatred is a disease." - Linus Torvalds
Now, a bird dropping a piece of bread on a section of the accelerator has, according to the Register, shut down the whole operation.
Isn't the Register only about 3/4 of one notch above the Onion?
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
The project will look at potential obstacles to the device, such as the effects of perfume
And completely ignores the premise that a religious fanatic about to die for his god might not be afraid at all!
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Or just: Airport bravity sense.. People use pheromones already. They can use whatever smell or whatever sense they want! Is that prohibited ? Imagine that a few years later you could find in a shop special "airport bravity sense" ? For "comfortable living with stupid fear sniffers" :-)
Who could eliminate the "fier factor" for people who are 1st time in a plane ?
These are ppl that have already made up their mind of HOW things will happen. If they know that they are going to die, they have already discarded the fear. As such, it is possible that these ppl will get by. OTH, if they are hoping to get out of it alive, then yeah, fear will be a big factor.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
...for identifying people who are frightened of being identified as being frightened.
> ...especially the fear in relation to criminal acts...
Bullshit. Someone whos is afraid that customs will catch him smuggling lizards will smell no different from someone who is afraid of flying (the lizards might, though).
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
A number of false positives reported in the media, and everybody will fear that machine...
Combine this with the government's need to keep everyone afraid. Now they can arrest almost anyone as a terrorist. And those few people that don't buy into the government hype and don't smell of fear? They obviously don't listen to Big Brother, so they must be terrorists too!
Don't take the above poster too seriously. He doesn't.
"true religious fanatic"
yeah, those will never be the people that will carry out a suicide bombing. The people that do the actual bombings seem to be the followers of the fanatics, and those followers haven't really thought through the whole thing so to speak. They are going to be scared.
I think the fanatics are just arrogant bullshitters, convincing others to sacrifice there _lives_, yet what to they give up?
bullshit
I wouldn't do well with this at all. If I knew that a fear detector was being used, I would start to be afraid that I might be afraid of it and that fear would grow into a panic that I might be sufficiently afraid to set the thing off, which would be scary because then I'd start imagining my interrogation at the hands of jackbooted DHS thugs with their enormous attack rottweilers and their hideous cattle prods. The image of rottweilers using cattle prods on me would be too much for me to bear and I'd just set off the fear detector, which would be a relief because then the suspense would finally be over and then the interrogation could begin in earnest.
Very truely yours,
Franz Kafka
The thought is that it will enable them to allow say 1/2 to 2/3 to get by quickly, and then focus resources on the smaller group. No doubt that there will be false positives, but, OTH, if you focus more resources on these, then you can process ppl faster.
I would be far more concerned about false negatives. I suspect that a terrorists who has already made up their mind to die is probably not quite as fearful. The true religious fanatics that have convinced themselves that either 72 virgins or Jesus or virgin mary or whatever awaits them in heaven is the one that will likely NOT be afraid. They are focused on a false end goal, so do not care about the means to it (though I am still trying to figure out what female muslims get; 72 virgin males? What a joke).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Animals smell it and react to it accordingly.
Ever been to Marine Corps boot camp? Couldn't get the smell out of the squad bay for a month.
Almost everything.
It's stupid.
I dearly hope my poor tax dollars don't pay for any of this garbage.
Anyone with a little training can control their brains alpha state and stay cool as a cucumber.
Then there are those sweaty people who naturally start sweating when standing belly to ass in line waiting waiting waiting.
Then there are those who are overdressed in airports for the cold climes to which they will arrive.
Then there are the sick.
The nervous and fearful of flying.
Those phobic of authority.
F$%kin morons might as well flip a coin to pick people out of a line.
If this is money spent by the taxpayer, those responsible should be stripped of their own personal wealth and have their possessions liquidated and be enslaved until such money reappears in the coffers.
Who thinks of this crap?
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
we just ground all aircrafts? get working on high speed rail and ships damn it!
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
There will be no stinkin' terrorists on my plane. Thats nothing to be sniffed at.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
Usually for these loss of freedom stories, we get the bleated "If you aren't doing anything wrong you have nothing to be afraid of" response. Where is it? Wait, what's that I smell? Scared sheeple?
Going on means going far
Going far means returning
This study stinks.
Someone had to do it...
... Pay more taxes and wait for new doggy style prodigy comming from behind.
Smoke weed before flying.
Such a detector would also nab people who are afraid of flying, or who are afraid they will miss their flight, or are anxious about meeting a new relative, or god-only-knows-what.
How can you get the smell right if the people jumping out of a plane aren't doing it illegally?
Like this guy. By the way, it's not illegal to cash $4700 in cash, nor do you have to answer nosy bastards questions about it, unless they obtain a warrant (signed by an impartial judge), or you are crossing an international border. This poor fellow just wanted to travel from St. Louis to Arlington Virgnia.
edited version- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMB6L487LHM
full recording- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEJpzVPmih0
I think I would have told these St. Louis police to read me my Miranda Rights, and then exercised my right to remain silent, rather than talk. Bunch of thugs. "It occurs to me that goose-stepping morons like yourself should try reading books instead of burning them." - Indiana Jones father, aka Sean Connery
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
"One is how to discover, against his will, what another human being is thinking, and the other is how to kill several hundred million people in a few seconds without giving warning beforehand. In so far as scientific research still continues, this is its subject matter.", 1984.
What we need is for "scientists" to find a correlation between fear and likelihood of committing terrorist acts. I'm always a little nervous going through airport security, probably because they make it a very stressful environment. I'm constantly reminding myself to suppress any sense of humor that has survived the baggage check process for fear of having a joke misinterpreted as hostility. They can already detain you if you look nervous (or insufficiently white).
So if this is the future...where's my jet pack?
A terrorist isn't afraid of creating terror, else he/she wouldn't have made it through terrorist camp, right? Or maybe it takes one to know one. I dunno...just sayin'.
Being afraid isn't a crime, nor is it probable cause for a search.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
A beta blocker would do just fine.
You've got it! The *terrorists* are not afraid.
They're Horny, Furious, Grim, Bored, or Psychopathic, but not afraid.
So if:
A - they believe it will detect (fear = terrorist) then they are morons;
B - they know it detects *everything except terrorists* then it's outright malice.
This is becoming a policy era "assume guilty of incompetent malice unless proved otherwise".
The incompetence throws off the geeks while the malice throws off the naive. Brilliant.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I just noticed this: "Your subject has negative warrants for arrest and negative prior history. He does have a valid oil land(?) that expires 2014." What the frak? They have a central computer to track all our history, even in foreign states that are 1000 miles away from where we live? Dang.
Other annoyances:
- "Why do you have this money?"
- "What's your occupation?"
- "It's not a matter of the law." - The Constitution is the law. It specifically forbids this type of detainment unless a judge okays it.
- "You're acting like a child." - No he's acting like a liberated person. Slavery ended 150 years ago. Liberated people have no masters and have the right to remain silent.
- "I don't have to let you travel." - The U.S. government official is violating the inalienable right to travel freely across the Union of states. (See SCOTUS cases.)
- "We'll have to take him down to the station and let the DEA and FBI question him..... we'll find out if you stole this money." - Wow. He's carrying lots of money, so suddenly he's an expected drug dealer or user? We have to involve the DEA??? I guess it's not safe to go on vacation anymore.
"What's Campaign for Liberty?" - that's something that doesn't exist anymore
Like I said before rather than play games with these goose-stepping thugs, I'd simply exercise my Miranda rights and shut up. That's what I did when I was detained in Texas. They wanted to search the trunk of my car. I refused. They held me in the cold night air for an hour asking questions and demanding the trunk be opened, and I refused to talk. Finally let me go. It's bullshit that officers think they can detain a guy on vacation and search his trunk without a warrant. (SCOTUS has confirmed they can not.)
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
And the winner is... the winner is: fear sniffer! Congratulations for this great investment!
"There is nothing to fear, but fear itself."
Perception is the thin dividing line between reality and fiction.
unfortunitly zealot terrorists have no fear. they are at one with there world,going to meet there maker and enjoy there reward. calm as cucumbers. alas another busted idea regards, mike
This is why I drive a car almost everywhere I go. I haven't flown in an airplane since 9/11 - it was a hassle before and now it's even more so.
I recall when I had to make a business trip from Oklahoma City to Minneapolis. My coworkers thought I was nuts when I said I was taking my car, so we had a kind of race. We both left the office early in the morning, and arrived in Minneapolis at about 7 p.m. that night. There was only half an hour difference. Plus I got $700 reimbursement for "car wear-and-tear" whereas they got nothing. Plus I didn't have to deal with airport stress.
I've driven my car everywhere from Alaska to California to Florida to Nova Scotia.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Be afraid, very afraid....
err, wait...
I used to hang out with a bunch of seriously hardcore criminals and "bad types". I strongly suspect, from firsthand experience, that anyone who believes in "fear associated with criminal activity" hasn't known very many criminals and doesn't really understand the "criminal mind", especially the sort of criminal who is deranged.
Like those who no longer can secrete Fear Pheromones, Like: Achmed the Dead terrorist.
That guy can walk right on by past this because even though he is a Terrorizing terrorist and his dead skeletal body can no longer produce fear pheromones because his flesh has all been blown off his body.
They will only now be stopping creepy people with lotion on puppets instead....
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
And here we have the start of.....Minority Report-like law enforcement!
This makes me wonder how it would handle a person who, in a novel moment, takes an antiperspirant and applies it everywhere that they could possibly sweat just an hour or two before they go through a fear detector.
Gives new meaning to the phrase "Wear deodorant, #@&&^!"
(It's called SpeedStick, it's not expensive.)
One of these days, I am going to flip out. When I flip out, I'll be back in five minutes.
Sufficiently organized malice is indistinguishable from incompetence.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
We have nothing to fear but [the smell of] fear itself.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Also, there is risk that the bomber will fail, this would cause huge embarassment to him, and maybe bad reprucussions for his family.
"...I think the Microsoft hatred is a disease." - Linus Torvalds
Now are being sued because the 100% reliable dogs are not nearly as reliable and the suspects turned out to probably be innocent (at least of the crimes of which they were sent to jail for.
I don't have a problem with new ideas. The problem is that police, government officials, and business executives all become completely naive and believe in the complete infallibility of things like this until they are shown to be grossly incorrect.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
they'll be deemed "olfactory cryptology" and will require end user certification before export outside the US.
Since when did slashdotters get concerned about their right to use deodorant?
use of fear-detectors! why stop there when so many more technologies could help! a few more ideas include:
-Phrenologists at the airport to determine if you match the description of a rapscallion or a evil-doer
-E-Meters to determine if youre under sinister influence of XENU
-Dr jebediah's fiend evaluator and dastardly deed prognosticator
-the divining rod of truth and justice
-immolations in concourse C and a drowning pool in concourse L to verify the presence of terrorist witchcraft.
Good people go to bed earlier.
... and all those inept nervous terrorists who smell bad.
I'd guess it would be negative. After all if you're afraid, surely you wouldn't do it?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
american civil character, 2009:
"We will sniff you if you have fear, so have no fear"
american civil character, 2085:
"The only thing we have to fear is rogue self-aware fear-sniffing robots"
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Again a study with only 20 samples!!! A study based on such a tiny amount of data does not have any scientific relevance! When do ever people learn that you need a much larger amount of data to produce a statement of any significant meaning!
http://www.failblog.org/ 'nuf said.
The fear detector works by sniffing out underarm sweat? How about they just use divining rods? Terrorist + bomb detector in one!
Good grief! People will try anything to avoid profiling, the only thing that actually has a chance of working. Just get the fuck over it already!
Political correctness will be the end of us.
Just ask the dead at Ft. Hood.
It has to be terror sweat!!
My wife is terrified of flying. Now I have to allocate another hour for the anal exam. Maybe we'll just drive.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
What they will miss:
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Inderol makes this a non-starter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inderal
Steve O.
I am really, really exhausted.
I searched DropZone.com and found this link: http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?do=post_view_flat;post=2005174;page=2;sb=post_latest_reply;so=ASC;mh=25; which actually may not work for folks without an account on DZ.com.
As so many posters have mentioned the false positives which will be created by such a nutty idea will be huge. A huge percentage of people are terrified of flying. Even I hate it...unless I'm flying the plane or wearing a parachute.
One of the dumbest applications of physiological response knowledge I've ever read.
Where is my parachute? I want off this the planet.
Ah , now i understand how this might actually work.
This sweat machine makes everyone afraid , because everyone sweats . Except offcourse the terrorists , who fear nothing.
So , if it registers no fear at all , it's most likely a terrorist , and we can catch them.
Slipping shoelaces ?
In away your right, from what I understand suicide bombers aren't even remotely afraid or even consider what they are doing to be anything but gods holy work.
They are people, too. Humans who their religion, peer pressure, status in society (you don't see wealthy businessmen blowing themselves up), etc. has forced to do something horrible. While they are doing something really bad, they are still humans and have emotions.
What do you think that a person thinks before blowing himself up in the middle of a crowd? Among people, some of whom might remind them of their own familymembers, for example? Maybe they have doubts about whether what they are doing is right or not (they have been told that it is right, but is it...). Maybe they are thinking of those family members who the'll never see again but who will be financially provided by the terrorist organization. Maybe they are thinking about surrendering to the officials while knowing that they will be no doubt thrown to jail for the rest of their life (with no fair trial) even if they do so (and their families might starve then). Maybe they are thinking what will happen if they get caught, can't push the button and certainly will neither get to heaven or get their families provided with...
Religious or not, these are humans we are talking about. They might do horrible things when the circumstances force them to but even then, they do have emotions.
...to America!
So now you are a terrorist if you wear antiperspirant. Because, if you're not a terrorist, then you have nothing to be afraid of, so if you are wearing antiperspirant, you must have something your hiding and you ARE afraid then you MUST be a terrorist.
Antiperspirant, the latest terrorist threat.
"It's because they're stupid, that's why. That's why everybody does everything." -Homer Simpson
The TSA Is a joke. If you want to improve security make the airlines responsible especially their Execs and managers for anything that goes on in their planes. Suddenly you will find that incedents drop through the floor. We take too much of the responsibility and heave it on the government. Let the air port be responsible for their airport and the airlines be responsible for their planes. That way it will run effeicently and effectively or people with lot of money spend time in prison.
Terrorists are not afraid. Nobody fears getting laid by 72 virgins.
Next the TSA agents will be meowing at us.
Remember the bioterrorist from 12 Monkeys? That's about how afraid terrorists are: happy.
0x or or snor perron?!
But he's a Ron Paul supporter! He must be up to no good!
I'm proud of anyone who stands up for his right to privacy in the face of The Man. But I saw this guy on a couple of interviews, and he's definitely a paranoid freak to think that those cops would have subjected him to something worse had he admitted that the money was collections from a Republican candidate's rally.
Now, if it had been collections for the movement to legalize marijuana, then he might have had some reason for concern. Donations from a Hillary rally might have gotten him some pissed off looks, but no real harassment. But Ron Paul? They'd be like, "Dude, you rock!"
Sure, man. The cops have a well-known anti-Republican bias.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
Sheesh. This might just be summarized "So, if he weighs as much as a duck, he is made of wood, and therefore.... a TERRORIST!"
It's not just security theater, it's security musical comic theater.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1312843/MI5s-secret-plan-to-recruit-gerbils-as-spycatchers.html
Excerpt: "MI5 considered using a team of highly-trained gerbils to detect spies and terrorists flying into Britain during the 1970s, ..."
They have a very keen sense of smell.
Well, they have DHS checkpoints on the roads already; who's to say such machines won't be installed there next?
So, what happens to those who are afraid of the fear detector?
First of all, the whole "War on Terror" concept is laughable, that's like saying lets have a War on Depresson; you can not fight an abstract idea. Furthermore, the people in charge of fighting this "war" are fighting like they are trying to defeat an enemy, if we are truly fighting a war on terror then wouldn't the logical thing to defeat be terror? As long as we remain afraid, the terrorists win, we can not defeat terror as long as we remain terrified of it. You remember the quote, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself"? Yes it's cliche, but it could not be applicable to where we stand today.
Is ask if they are Republican..... That's a prime indicator of terrorist leanings. Seconded by being a democrat.
I'm sorry, I'm to tired to be witty at the moment so this message will have to do.
Look, I am always worried when arriving at security control, even though I am 100% legit. I feel intimidated, I worry that they'll keep me too long and I might miss boarding - I had to open my bag twice, because the cheese I was carrying looked suspicious on X-ray. So I'd trigger the sniffing machine.
On the other hand, a terrorist might be quite relaxed, because it's his/her nature. Or he/she might be a psychopath, and they feel no fear.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
>>>he's definitely a paranoid freak to think that those cops would have subjected him to something worse had he admitted that the money was collections from a Republican candidate's rally.
>>>
Oh really? Two weeks before this event, Missouri had announced they would start treating libertarians and constitutionalists as potential terrorists worthy of further investigation.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Yes and I've been stopped by them in Texas and my brother in New Hampshire. My brother happily complied (fool), but I refused to let the Texas dipshits search my trunk. They made me stand-around for an hour before finally letting me go. I wasn't crossing an international border, so the stop and attempted-search was unjustified.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.
Ceci n'est pas un post.
This is america. Everybody in america is afraid...except suicide bombers. Maybe the detector will only sound an alarm if no fear is detected.
Many people take Xanax while flying. I'm tempted myself, not because I worry about the plane crashing, but because sitting on the tarmac for two hours with no air conditioning, crammed in next to some fat bastard with his shrieking kids, well, it doesn't suit me.
I don't see why the imaginary terrorists couldn't take Xanax or equivalent. So really, what the "security" people should do is molest the people who aren't afraid, stressed, or angry. Clearly something is wrong with those bastards.
hey boys, i think we got a terrorist...
oh wait... i've just got gas
We have nothing to fear but [the smell of] fear itself.
Thus spawning a whole new market for deodorants.
I am anarch of all I survey.
No, if she weighs as much as a duck, she's a witch. If he /smells/ like a duck, he's a terrorist. .... And that, my liege, is how we know the earth to be banana-shaped.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
I vaguely remember something like that being claimed, back when this was news. But it seemed like a really selective interpretation of the facts. Source?
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!