In a recent column for the Washington Post, columnist George Will said the following about the new airport screening procedures:
What the TSA is doing is mostly security theater, a pageant to reassure passengers that flying is safe. Reassurance is necessary if commerce is going to flourish and if we are going to get to grandma’s house on Thursday to give thanks for the Pilgrims and for freedom. If grandma is coming to our house, she may be wanded while barefoot at the airport because democracy – or the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment; anyway, something – requires the amiable nonsense of pretending that no one has the foggiest idea what an actual potential terrorist might look like. [“The T.S. of A Takes Control,” Washington Post, 21 November 2010]
The concept of “security theater” caught my attention because Debra and I had expressed the same idea (although not with so nifty a phrase) on several occasions. While “security theater” is problematic for a number of reasons (inconvenience, cost, and lack of effectiveness being only three) the larger issue of confusing appearance with—for lack of a better word—reality needs addressing. In NLP terms, this is essentially a “map” and “territory” issue. Unfortunately, if you give people a map, too many of them think that it is the territory.
All too often, fear is used as a distraction. I’ve commented in previous blogs about the amygdala, the part of the brain that scans the environment for risk. If it becomes aware of something scary, it triggers the “flight, fight, or freeze” response. If you are walking down the garden path and see a stick that looks like a snake, you are likely to assume that it is a snake. If you already believe that snakes are scary, you will have a fear response. It is that response that makes “security theater” possible. If you are afraid that terrorists are going to blow up your airplane, you willingly stand in line at the airport to be scanned and groped.
When a fear is irrational, the response to it will be irrational as well. If you don’t know snakes well enough to be able to distinguish poisonous from nonpoisonous, it’s best to be careful if you see something that looks like a snake. If you panic and run from a stick, however, you may well hurt yourself in some other way, if only by increasing your blood pressure. It’s best to make sure that the map in your head is accurately communicating the details of the territory. “Looks like a snake” and “is a snake” are different, and your mental map needs to register that. Being “safe” is a basic human need, and the amygdala is right to warn us when it perceives a possible risk. Humans are also equipped with a hippocampus, which places elements from the environment in context, so that we can make intelligent choices about whether to be fearful.
We are born with only two fears: falling and loud noises. All other fears are learned, and we can also learn to overcome the fear of falling (otherwise, no one would go sky diving) and loud noises (in the U.S., think 4th of July). A lot of people have to do a lot of work to generate the kind of fear that creates the kind of “security theater” we have at airports. This is not quite the same as wanting seat belts and airbags installed in vehicles we will hurl down the highway at freeway speeds. First, we need terrorists who are “out to get us.” Second, we need examples of what terrorists can do, and we have had some examples of that in recent years. Third, we need governmental agencies and the media telling us that we need to be very afraid. The irony is that if we are very afraid, the terrorists have caused the terror they desired—and, in that sense, they have “won.” They have also won in the sense that resources that could have been dedicated to investigating the “territory” of terrorism are instead being spent on the appearance of security.
One of the so-called terror experts being interviewed on TV recently said, “If the terrorists are at the airport, it is too late.” He pointed out that all they would need to do is get in one of the long lines, and set a bomb off. While we want to keep crazies of all varieties off airplanes (and buses, trains, and streets), full-body scans and gropings before boarding may not be the best way to do that. We are so busy watching for the snake on the garden path that we fail to see the one hanging in the tree. Appearance, after all, works in both directions: we see things that aren’t there, and we fail to see things that are. We forget that the map is not the territory in more than one way.
Not too long ago, truck drivers in France started acquiring and using GPS systems. The GPS devices, however, weren’t programmed to know which roads and streets could accommodate trucks, and so a lot of trucks got stuck between buildings while trying to follow the GPS routes originally intended for pedestrians, horses, and buggies. I haven’t read about stuck French truck drivers for a while, and I’m not sure how—or whether—they solved the problem, but this is another example of map and territory confusion. The truck drivers looked at the GPS map and followed the directions. It wasn’t until their trucks were stuck that they looked at the territory.
George Will, whose comments I quoted at the beginning of this blog, is right about “security theater.” He is wrong, however, about knowing what a terrorist looks like. In actuality we don’t. Going by appearance is the equivalent of panicking at the sight of a snake because some happen to be poisonous. We have to be willing to examine the territory rather than simply going by appearance. The territory is, of course, both larger and more complicated than the maps that represent it, but until we really know the territory, we can’t possibly produce an accurate map of it. Further, we can’t possibly explore the territory when we are afraid. “Security theater” is basically the equivalent of a child’s hiding under the blankets because he or she is afraid of what might be in the dark.
This time of year, many of us in the U.S. are celebrating Thanksgiving. Regardless of where you are, however, you can be thankful for knowing that the more you know, the less you fear and for being willing to get to know the various territories that may have seemed scary to you in the past. One of the first things, of course, is the saying, “follow the money.” When others tell you to be afraid, check to see what they will gain by having you be sufficiently afraid that you buy their product, service, or political views. Not all fears, of course, are unjustified. If you—or someone you love—is old and unsteady on his or her feet, the often ridiculed fear expressed in the TV ads, “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up,” can be an accurate expression of reality. Check to make sure that any fear you have is an accurate expression of reality, or whether you’ve been “sold” a fear to enrich someone else.
When others tell you to be afraid, the fear that might be justified is that they are about to put their hands on your wallet.
