By Capt. Fogg
My first thought was: I've seen this scenario in some cheesy Tom Cruise infected Sci-Fi movie. Apparently that thought occurred to the Nature.com editorial staff as well. The Department of Homeland Security it would seem, is testing a system to detect malicious thoughts. No really.
They call it Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST) because that's what government departments do with their doings, lest clear speech shed clear light. They make up acronyms that disguise the tunnels they dig under the foundations of liberty, but I digress. The technology purports to identify individuals who are planning to blow things up or have "malintent" as they say in the dialect.
Like a more traditional polygraph, FAST measures heart rates, among other things. Heart rates respiration and perspiration go up, after all when you're nervous about the bomb in your shorts or wishing you could throttle some thick-skull TSA twit as he gives you grief over an aspirin in your pants pocket that shows up on a scanner and starts groping you for explosives as you put your hands over your head in abject submission. Hell I'm sure I'd set off all kinds of alarm bells right now just thinking of how I've so often been treated as a felon on his way into the penitentiary instead of a tired traveler trying to get home.
I have no idea about what else this electro-mechanical night club bouncer measures and I'm not sure it invades any privacy that hasn't already been taken away by the cowardly traitors who passed the "Patriot" Act. I'm too lazy and too unwilling to provoke myself into another Lewis Black style tantrum to read the " Privacy Impact Assessment" our bureaucratic brethren at DHS have given us. I'll leave that to you. Besides my loathing of people who seem to exist only for the purpose of inserting that fly-blown and putrid metaphor into every sentence, it was written, most revealingly, by someone any German speaker will recognize as the Devil himself: Hugo Teufel III, Chief Privacy offer at the DHS under George W. Bush.
Does it work any better than the Polygraph does at detecting the evasions of sociopaths? It would have to, since those tend to be the people we're looking to put on no-fly lists and of course we won't have the results interpreted by a seasoned professional, but rather someone who was promoted from K-Mart security officer last week.
No, it's the stuff of B movies or sarcastic Dr. Strangelove sequels or even Orwell novels, but perhaps we've lost the ability even to see what the politics of fear has done to us in our cringing, cowardly new century.
Yesterday's cheesy sci-fi is tomorrow's reality. Meanwhile, there's today...
ReplyDeleteSo the DHS has done a PIA of its shiny new FAST (to be interpreted by the TSA)? Well! That sounds promising. They won’t need FAST to read my mind on this one: it’s ridiculous. Not one bit of this nonsense makes us an ounce or an inch safer. Any half-competent terrorist could succeed under the current regimen because the security hoops begin only when one is very near to boarding the plane. Almost everything we’re doing is exactly what it’s been called: security theater, crowd control.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing protecting civilization from ruin is the fact that not too many people really want us all to go back to living in caves and throwing rocks at one another: almost everybody’s on board with this project called “civilization,” and if they weren’t, the whole thing would become impossible PDQ, Patriot Acts and alleged mind-reading machines notwithstanding. Our problems call for diplomatic solutions and wise foreign policy, not Keystone Cops or worse tactics employed against ourselves.
The awful thing is, laws like PATRIOT are practically impossible to get rid of – power once given isn’t likely to be returned, in part because that’s just the way people are (Acton’s Law and all that, you know) and in part because giving it back would make the Democrats -- the only party that might be willing to give it back on principle -- look weak. You can look forward to many “refinements” of this lovely piece of legislation in years to come, and any terrorist attack will make matters infinitely worse.
I have a relative who has had a heck of a time getting his name cleared from the "No Fly List". His name is John Smith. I kid you not!! He was able to get by the list by purchasing tickets when he included his middle name.
ReplyDeleteDino:
ReplyDeleteIt's theater at best and another expensive boondoggle/intrusion at worst. So far as I know, none of this multi billion dollar security hype has foiled any plots and it's all predicated on the notion that they'll try the same thing again. They may not be so dumb.
But we are.
I've seen that Tom Cruise film and the whole predicting crimes before they happened thing didn't work out so well.
ReplyDeleteLie detectors are unreliable and not allowed as evidence in a court of law; why would they think that FAST is going to be any more reliable? Besides, you can't punish people for thoughts! I've done some pretty horrid things in my head.
We've given up so much freedom for the illusion of safety.
Heart rate? Perspiration? Anxiety? If they'd hooked me up a few years ago I could have blown the thing up. Now that I'm safely post-menopausal, I Do Not Give A Damn What They Or Anyone Else Think.
ReplyDeleteMurr
ReplyDeleteI just sprinted the hundred yards from the docks and up a flight of stairs. I have a beard, I'm a terrorist. How much more evidence does one need?
Sheria,
There are those who can pass a polygraph test while lying through their teeth. I suspect they would make great terrorists. As to thought crimes, I've been complaining about laws like those that criminalize "intent" and assume intent without evidence for a long time.
This of course wouldn't criminalize those selected, but it would prevent them from flying or at least subject them to further screening.
I've also been complaining just as loudly about our Safety Culture which has been growing all my life. My parents were overprotective for my generation, but the things I was allowed to do unsupervised would open them up to prosecution today. We have so many organizations crusading to take all risk out of life (if only one life is saved it will be worth it) and they become more extreme all the time.
We are and always have been a witch hunting society and remain one and you can't pin it on the Liberals or Conservatives -- we all do it, pinning accusations of racism, sexism, Communism, thisism and thatism and terrorism is a bonanza for witch hunters.
I have not been on an airplane since the late 90's so I've never had the distinct privilege of having my personal space violated by the TSA. I often entertain subversive thoughts (or am entertained by them, it works both ways) and I've been known to get defensive when I am presumed guilty, so I could be in for a very uncomfortable time at the airport.
ReplyDelete