3rd degree tonight and GCSB

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#1169922 6-Nov-2014 11:59

SaltyNZ:
Geektastic:

Those of us who have actually lived with and through terrorist attacks are perhaps a little less able to put our fingers in our ears and go 'la la la la' when the subject comes up.

And yet we'd still be better off overall if we took all the time, effort and money that we put into chasing terrorists and put it into, say, breast cancer research instead.

Well, in that instance, only 50% of us would be better off...

As I understand it, your message is that as long as terrorists kill less people than diseases, we need not concern ourselves with their activities?

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#1169935 6-Nov-2014 12:10

Geektastic:

Well, in that instance, only 50% of us would be better off...

Well, that's a whole more people better off than the alternative. And anyway, you're ignoring the fact that you would be better off if your mother/daughter/wife/girlfriend were alive than dead.

As I understand it, your message is that as long as terrorists kill less people than diseases, we need not concern ourselves with their activities?

No, I'm suggesting we calm the hell down and put our resources into activities where they derive the most benefit. Based on the actual facts so far, it's diseases and accidents: 1,000,000; terrorists: 1. If it makes you feel better, maybe we let the breasts look after themselves and put the money into hospital emergency departments and ambulance services instead. That way we're protecting ourselves against accidents, diseases and terrorists. Personally, I'm quite fond of breasts though.

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#1169946 6-Nov-2014 12:29

But just to be completely anal about things, don't assume that research into breast cancer just helps with researching and preventing breast cancer.

In pretty much the same way that you can't assume that collection of metadata by organisations designated to prevent terrorism will only ever lead to action against terrorists.

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#1169948 6-Nov-2014 12:33

Geektastic, where have you lived that has experienced terrorism?

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#1169950 6-Nov-2014 12:38

KiwiNZ: Our current airport security is lax especially on regional routes. But generally our security is poor.

I spend a reasonable amount of time flying regional routes to service our customers (I work for a software vendor).

Back in June I was in Canada attending a conference with the vendor over there. Their consultants said regional turbo prop flights are the same over there (i.e. scan boarding pass and walk onto the plane). So other countries have the same security as we do in that regard. I would loathe having to turn up 30-40 minutes earlier just to clear security.

Having said that the same consultants had to stand in the same insane TSA style security queue as me when leaving Toronto even though I was flying to the US and they were flying internally (on a jet).

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#1169969 6-Nov-2014 12:56

DarthKermit: Geektastic, where have you lived that has experienced terrorism?

Anyone who lived in England, Northern Ireland, Spain, Italy, Greece, Germany during the 1970s, 80s and 90s would have. I did, and have.

Those are just off the top of my head, of course. But active terrorist attacks are a recent living memory for a lot of people.

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#1170003 6-Nov-2014 13:34

Geektastic:
As I said, fortunately many of you have little experience of these things. Once you do, your views will change.

You keep saying that but everyone reacts differently.
I was working for the BBC in London at the time of 2001 BBC Bombing, I was in Soho on the night of the The Admiral Duncan bombing and I would have been passing through Shepherd's Bush on the day of the failed 21 July 2005 London bombings except I was on holiday in Egypt and was still there during the Sharm el-Sheikh attacks a few days later.

I saw some of fantastic 'blitz' mentality of many locals going about their business as normal after the events to avoid 'letting the bastards win'.
I also saw things like the complete botch-up by security forces that resulted in the death of Jean Charles de Menezes due to mistaken identity and the subsequent mis-information that was fed to the media by the police.
For me personally, having seen knee-jerk anti-terror legislation that subsequently gets misused and media scare-mongering, I want to see any new legislation get as much discussion as possible.
I fully understand that in some circumstances there is a need for rushed legislation and special powers in response to specific events but anything passed that way should also have a build in automatic expiry date and only be renewed once it has had full due-process and public consultation.

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#1170025 6-Nov-2014 13:56

ckc:
DarthKermit: Geektastic, where have you lived that has experienced terrorism?

Anyone who lived in England, Northern Ireland, Spain, Italy, Greece, Germany during the 1970s, 80s and 90s would have. I did, and have.

Those are just off the top of my head, of course. But active terrorist attacks are a recent living memory for a lot of people.

*Anyone*? That's like saying that anyone who has lived in New Zealand has experienced break and enter. (Much more common than terrorism).

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#1170033 6-Nov-2014 14:06

Since Geektastic hasn't been back online to answer, I'll leave it to him to do so. I was only asking whereabouts to get an idea of what kind(s) of terrorism he may have experienced, depending on which country he was living in.

We're very lucky in NZ (to date) to have had so little terrorism.

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#1170145 6-Nov-2014 15:59

I have never personally experienced terrorism though I have been places where it was happening. My own feeling is that I would rather risk the slight possibility of random beheading than the certainty of mass government surveillance. Would I change my mind if I actually did experience terrorism? It is hard to know for certain, but I don’t think so. My privacy is important to me and I deeply resent the thought of total strangers with unknown beliefs and prejudices sifting through my private communications like fetishists going through an underwear drawer. What I think or believe is no-one else’s business. Ever. One thing that strikes me about these kinds of discussions is the apparent bland assumption that the individuals doing the spying are somehow neutral in a way, a bit like machines, just collecting and analysing information. Yet all other government departments open to public scrutiny tend to have at least some employees who are inefficient, incapable, incompetent, or even dishonest. Call it the Dilbert effect. The difference is these people can be held to account, especially if they deal with the public. Secret squirrel types say trust me, I’m an expert. I know things you don’t. I say trust has to be earned and how can that happen when people you don’t know, never heard of, and probably wouldn’t like if you did know them, can declare you an Enemy of the State whenever they like for reasons you are not allowed to know about? Thanks but no thanks. I prefer the terrorists. At least with them you know who is out to get you.

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#1170154 6-Nov-2014 16:08

Geektastic: That is hardly the same as, for example, a busload of school kids being blown up in Auckland.

As I said, fortunately many of you have little experience of these things. Once you do, your views will change.

To that I say Norfolk Hotel that got flattened in Nairobi 1980 and Docklands 1996.

So glad your assumptions on people are always based on fact.

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#1170210 6-Nov-2014 17:24

SaltyNZ:
ckc:
DarthKermit: Geektastic, where have you lived that has experienced terrorism?

Anyone who lived in England, Northern Ireland, Spain, Italy, Greece, Germany during the 1970s, 80s and 90s would have. I did, and have.

Those are just off the top of my head, of course. But active terrorist attacks are a recent living memory for a lot of people.

*Anyone*? That's like saying that anyone who has lived in New Zealand has experienced break and enter. (Much more common than terrorism).

Anyone. Everyone is used to seeing bins boarded up, or being aware of unattended bags or packages, or getting used to delays in transport due to bomb threats, or in Ireland getting used to army checkpoints, or big walls between communities, or having CCTV everywhere, or being subject to stop and search without arrest or detainment.

So anyone. Much like you lock your doors when you go out, the experience of state attempts to combat terrorism goes beyond those who are direct victims of terrorist acts.

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#1170221 6-Nov-2014 17:48

Ah, I see you meant it in a different way to what I thought. I interpreted the question as 'Where were you when you nearly got blown up?'

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#1170271 6-Nov-2014 19:30

SaltyNZ:
KiwiNZ: It only needs one to bring down a plane.

Does it? Maybe it did in 2001. But who's going to get away with bringing down a plane in 2014? The underpants bomber didn't. The second he looked twitchy he was overpowered by all the other passengers and was forced to spend the rest of the flight tied up with a burnt crotch. Because now everybody knows the game has changed - it used to be that if you were hijacked, the worst that was going to happen was that you'd sit on the tarmac for two days in some flyover country and then go home again after your holiday was ruined. After 9/11 everybody knows that a hijacker might try to kill you all immediately. So even if he somehow managed to smuggle an AK-47 onto the plane, the moment he looks like he's about to pull the trigger, 200 people are going to pile on and turn him into a stain on the carpet.

Even allowing for terrorism, more people die on the roads in New Zealand every year than are typically killed in air disasters. More people have died in Space Shuttle accidents (14) than have died from terrorism (1, on the Rainbow Warrior) in New Zealand. I don't think we can make the comparison any starker than that.

It's just not something we have to panic about.

It's just not something we have to panic about........

I'm going to assume that people also said the same when the national road toll was 'only' one per year.

Things change.

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#1170272 6-Nov-2014 19:35

MikeSkyrme:
I'm going to assume that people also said the same when the national road toll was 'only' one per year.

Things change.

Yes, they do. But in the face of the far greater threat of the road toll, we didn't ban cars. We didn't force everyone to keep detailed logs of their trips... We thought about it, debated it publicly, and came up with a bunch of solutions that everyone is OK to live with, that are set out in public, and enforced in public, with a public right of appeal for those who believe they have been dealt with unfairly.

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