Erna said:
I assumed that Joe was referring to all the measures put into place to ensure a fascist state, but I wanted to start a discussion / thought process as to why he believes that this particular measure (airport security) is furthering that goal.
When one understands something and it makes sense, then a lot of other things start making sense and taking shape simultaneously. So if I can understand what these measures would accomplish, then I can move forward in my understanding of this whole matter.
I have mentioned this a while ago, but I will say it again. When I relay information on this site to others, I get the why's a lot. And if I myself is unable to make sense as to what exactly these measures accomplish, how can I possibly make someone else grasp the concept.
lots of security implies the reality of a threat, the implication of the reality of a threat creates fear among the population, fear among the population breeds a knee-jerk emotional-based dependence on authority to protect them from the threat, and this dependency then inhibits the tendency for independent and logical thought among the people. Because when you have made the decision that you depend on someone else for your physical safety, you tend to do what they say, or let them do the thinking for you.
This is the goal of increased security measures.
This situation creates a feedback loop, where the inducing of this dependency on the state for protection then feeds the reality of "the terror threat" in the minds of the people because they are unable to think logically about the practical aspects of the reality of the terror threat.
As Allen suggested, with the highly 'securitised' situation in Western nations at present, it would be very very difficult for any real terrorist organisation to actually carry out an effective attack. Police are literally everywhere, the UK has literally millions of CCTV cameras around the nation, and other Euro nations are moving in the same direction. Not only is the terrorists' ability to carry out an attack seriously curtailed at the site of any potential terror attack, but the extent to which Western governments currently control many supposedly "terrorist harboring" nations via finances and the proliferation of weapons, means that "terrorists" are also seriously curtailed at the planning stage.
There is also the logical deduction that it is extremely counter-productive for any "terrorist" organisation to attack innocent civilians of any nation.
Every real terrorist organisation over the years has been fully aware of this and has ultimately included it as a central aspect of their strategy. Those "terrorist" organisations that did attempt to indirectly attack an enemy government by killing innocent civilians believing that such attacks would cause the people to turn on their own government and ask "what did you (our government) do to these people to make them attack us?" quickly realised that this does not work in practice because, in a state of trauma such as that following a mass casualty attack, people want revenge, they do not want to think.
Such "terror" attacks on civilians therefore have always been a gift to governments because it immediately places the population behind a war-mongering government. It is logical to conclude therefore that terror attacks on civilians serve one of the core agendas of governments - to wage war - not that of "terrorists" who generally only exist as a response to the very same wars (of colonisation) waged by governments. Of course, it is natural that governments would want to reverse this and posit the "terrorists" as the force that emerged out of nothing and against which governments fight. The reality is in fact exactly the opposite, and the "force" that emerged out of nowhere (so to speak) and needs nothing other than the existence of "prey" in order for it to act, is not "terrorists" but psychopaths. All other actual resistance groups (aka "terrorists") are a response to this force, whether they know it or not (most do not).
None of these details about the origin or likelihood of the reality of "terrorism" as presented by Western governments are likely to ever enter the minds of the people however, primarily because of the fear-based, blind dependency on the dictates of the state, that is encouraged by way of the spreading of the fear of the "reality" of terrorism by the state in the first place. This "reality" however, is not real at all.
So essentially, as long as the "reality" of fake terrorism can be manufactured in the minds of the people, there is no reason to believe that the people will ever question that reality. Basically, as long as it exists in the mind of the people it is a "reality".
It was to this strategy, I believe, that the unnamed Neocon was referring last year when he said (as quoted by NY Times journalist Ron Suskind):
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/17/magazine/17BUSH.html?ex=1255665600en=890a96189e162076ei=5090
[...] he told me something that at the time I didn't fully comprehend -- but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency.
The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''
The judicious studying of the discernible reality of "Islamic terrorism" proves it to be not real at all. This is why the unnamed Neocon stated that "that's not the way the world really works anymore", because they cannot have ordinary people judiciously studying reality and coming to this conclusion. The solution to this problem, from the Neocon point of view, is to create a "reality" that, while bearing no resemblance to actual reality, nevertheless becomes THE reality because it is effectively manufactured in and propped up by the "belief center" of the general population, and this belief is a result of government fear-based propaganda about the "reality of Islamic terrorism", the "evidence" for which is provided by the existence of "increased security", which IS judiciously discernible.
People are terrified into believing that "Islamic terrorism" exists and as a result they are rendered incapable of questioning the reality of that which they have been forced to believe.
It's a trap, a virtual prison for the masses, the very substance of which consists of the credulousness of the people themselves.
All in all, we find ourselves in a bit of a quandary, to put it mildly. The only thing we can do it seems, is to strive to get the real reality of the situation firmly embedded in our brains. From there, we can have some hope of helping others to do the same. As long as our ability to see and think logically remains infected with this type of reversal of reality and double/triple think however, we will be no good to anyone, least of all ourselves.
Joe
