On this blog I have mentioned on several occasions how useless and pointless and many other “something-less” airport security measures were up to this point in time.
I spoke to airport security officials about it from time to time, experts on the field, engineers that designed the x-ray machines and such... and now I stand vindicated when it was proven that all of the measures amount to nothing if people don't try to do their jobs with a bit of professionalism and consistency.
So, everyone is aware of the Detroit “terrorist attack” perpetrated by a Nigerian youth that, according to recent news, “felt lonely and ignored." If feeling depressed was a valid excuse to blow people up then fair enough, but it isn't.
It is slightly annoying to find out that the reason this came to be was because some random asshole didn't check that Mr. Farouk was ALREADY in the list of terrorist suspects and let him on the plane.
There are many things wrong with that. First, on a personal level, that kid should have known that when your previously supporting family draws a line and informs the government that you are a terrorist maybe you have some issues.
That does not happen simply because you complained about Christians or decided to become Muslim... it takes a bit more and it requires really worrying attitudes. I mean... your own father reported you. Get a hint.
So, what did he achieve with this foolhardy attitude? Well... being sent to a hospital with the guy that knocked him down and... now people have been banned from reading books on the last hour of the flight... or using a blanket.... or holding a baby.
Yes, Mr. Farouk, your attempt at a jihad only ended up bringing really pathetic “security” measures and also makes people laugh in disbelief when they are told about them.
Not that that can be all blamed on Mr. Farouk. He didn't tell them to make up useless rules, in fact he only brought to light that people at the airport where he departed were not doing their jobs and that inspired the quacks at homeland security to emerge from their cubicles laughing manically with new “improvements” for the security of passengers.
I am sure that reading a copy of the “The Secret Garden” is going to be a serious threat to national security and god/goddess/entity/nothing out there forbid a mother holding her child!
How is it that it is illegal to drive around in a car with a child of a certain age without a specialized seat and it is not only legal but now encouraged to put it on a random, adult-sized seat in an airplane about to land? What if the baby gets loose from under the belt and the movement of the plane sends him rolling down the aisle?
And what does the TSA representative has to say about the incongruousness of these “security measures”? According to the Associated Press, it was a verbatim: "It keeps them guessing”
So, in a combination of inadequate performance of duty and a depressed youth that rather than off himself somewhere decided to take others of a different religious inclination with him in the ultimate act of self-serving egoistical whim (which I think is also against the rules written down by the prophet, but well, don't quote me on that) we are all inconvenienced. Well done.
This also brings out something else to rant about... Personally, I don't think having a religion is a bad thing. Be it Christian, or Muslim or Wicca, your religious beliefs are pretty much a choice in life-style that will affect how you interact with people, as such choices do.
However, those same groups have what we call “Fanatics” and to be clear they don't come only in “Main Religious Colors” no, there are Wicca/Pagan fanatics, just the same as there are Atheist Fanatics.
Fanaticism is, after all, not limited to people that pray, it is a blend of absolute, unquestionable, unbending and fastidious belief in an idea... equally encountered in “God exists” and “God doesn't exist”
I am much less afraid of the average Muslim than I am of the average Christian Fanatic. In fact, I am not afraid at all of the average Muslim. But I do feel threatened by the average Christian Fanatic.
And it is not because they are “right” or I am afraid to see the “truth” but rather because they are more likely to invade my personal space with their BS and encourage me to retaliate by introducing my elbow to their kidney.
The danger out there with religion has never been its existence. I have heard some people say “blame it on religion” but that's simply not how it works. You can argue the validity of religion, but you cannot blame the stupidity and single mindedness of fanatics on it.
Both the Bible and the Koran have simple and good advice in their pages. As books, they are also to be taken in context. Things have changed, a fact that the Fanatic does not understand.
Change is part of the stories and in their own time that change was what causes [some] contradictions to pop up in it. It is the blind acceptance of the literal that creates hate towards the different or interpretative.
Take the whole Palestine and Israel thing going on. It has even gotten to the point of not being anything more than a brawl of “I want this to be mine!” and “I won't share!”
Although people make jokes about Scientology, I bet not even half of them are as wild eyed and crazy-looking as Tom Cruise was on that spiel about Psychologists. Nor, for that matter do I believe all “Satanists” are actually sacrificing children as people tend to imagine. The ones that do that are not only mentally unstable, they are also fanatics.
I honestly tire of the “You are one of these: choose a group/hobby/life-style from list A therefore you are automatically this: choose an adjective from list B” approach.
| List A | List B |
| Christian | Crazy |
| Muslim | Loser |
| Wicca | Fanatic |
| Gamer | Terrorist |
| RPGer | Uneducated |
| Footballer | Brain-dead |
| Cheerleader | Dweeb |
| Mexican | Bimbo |
And sadly it is not only fed by the fanatics of the groups that are being “classified," but also socially acceptable to some degree.
It is comfortable and easy to set yourself to an idea and make it your belief because admitting to the fact that you just might be wrong makes you think and generally you tend to find that you are wrong about something. So people feel fit to conform their surroundings into simple black and white.
Because, no matter what everyone says, no matter how much a “law” is written down on stone... there is ALWAYS gray.
A person will simplify another individual's existence by putting them in categories they can make fun of and demoralize to feel superior. What other point is there in criticizing a hobby than to assure yourself on some level that you are not as pathetic as you perceive others that have it to be? What other point is there in dehumanizing a follower of a different religion than to make yourself look wiser or more holly?
So if you want to say that religion is what messed up today, maybe you should consider that the real reason the world is messed up today on many levels is because of religious fanaticism in some way or another. Not from a single faith. Not by a single group. And certainly not by the majority.
Just like a small mistake is more easily remembered by your peers than most of your achievements, the few religious fanatics that go ahead and kill others before dying or prove how much they are unbending and say it is a proof of “faith” before dying are even less dangerous than the idiotic religious fanatics that turn them into martyrs or use them as an example.
The problem with some religious fanatics is that their devotion to a single cause makes others look up to them (which is the other side of the problem: gullible idiots) and follow their lead in blind-faith to a certain bloody result.
Contrary to some people's beliefs it is different when people fight a battle for lands because they NEED the lands to grow crops than when people decide to invade another country because their “god” told them so. Which, also translates into attacking and killing innocent people in the name of religion.
The fact that some people don't understand how that is wrong is depressing by itself.
Hell, even if their tactics are pretty much useless and have proven to be not fool-proof at least the “anti-terrorist countries” try to go (or at least they claim to go) for the terrorists and their leaders, rather than shooting civilians to try to get to them.
Whereas what we get from terrorists is how they are going to win by killing all infidels (aka everyone else), which by the way at this points means the same as “heathens” so just because Christian fanatics don't tie bombs to their bodies yet don't think you are too far away from doing it too.
Like with swords and guns, you cannot blame the use of religion on religion itself. It is the people that use it that are to blame and religion gets judged along with them.
It is not the average Christian, Jew or Muslim that accuses Television or Video Games (on TV, no less) of bringing out evil and mayhem in people, or that it causes them to want to kill others.
The average believer of any religion will not feel threatened by change, because their faith evolves with them. It is just the Fanatics that cannot and will not understand that their frame of mind has been left behind.
This is not a world of Fanatic vs Fanatic. It is about the Fanatics vs the Rest of Us. The more we allow fanaticism to grow, the more intolerance and and bigotry is allowed to express itself in violence and we not only stop it or cut it off at the bud, but condone it and cheer it on, then the more this world is going to sink and drag the rest of us down with it.
