
Terminal: How the airport came to embody our national psychosis - jseliger
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/cover_story/2017/09/how_airports_became_temples_of_our_national_fear_fueled_psychosis.html
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makecheck
Knowledge of statistics is severely lacking, and airports are just a prominent
example of this (people freaking out over what is an incredibly unlikely
threat). Another example would be, leaning _way too heavily_ into what a
handful of people say in comments, when there’s no way you could ever read
enough comments to form a statistically significant sample of what “people
think” of you.

The incredible rarity of these events should have shut down most spending from
the beginning, and a new government department should _never_ have been
allowed to form around it (any more than we should have allowed a “Department
of Lightning Safety” to be created). Then they compound the problem by
allowing _rare events within rare events_ (such as “shoes may kill us!!!”) to
drive entire policies and waste even more time and money.

Heck, if we understood statistics we’d be marching in the streets demanding a
far larger number of representatives, since having approximately one million
people “represented” by a member of the house means they could never possibly
know what their constituents want even if they spent every free hour trying to
find out.

What I want is for people to be educated enough about statistics to not be
fooled, and not to overreact to things based on what a few poor samples tell
them.

~~~
perseusprime11
You’re talking about data driven decision making as opposed to fear based
decision making. If we are so smart, we would have hired psychometricians to
advice every aspect of our government.

~~~
solotronics
I remember reading that Ross Perot wanted to do this if he became president.
He also wanted direct voting at electronic voting stations so people could
vote on specific laws.

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jballanc
I, too, have noticed the decline in airports. Both status and comfort are
severely lacking from even the 1980s when, as a child, my family and I spent
many a flight delay waiting for my father to return from a business trip. But
something the article fails to mention: this seems to be a uniquely American
phenomenon. The airports I've interacted with elsewhere in the world have been
head-and-shoulders above anything in the US.

~~~
Fnoord
> The airports I've interacted with elsewhere in the world have been head-and-
> shoulders above anything in the US.

Which ones have that been, and when?

The most hilarious things are the lithium ion conundrum. 1) People being
required to hand over their mobile electronic devices, to have Customs logging
in and 2) the thing where they were illegal to be carried in hand bagage
forcing them to non-hand bagage where its arguably less safe.

The other funny hysteria (for a non-NT) I remember is the liquid/water
hysteria. But that one was active in EU as well!

I feel like EU isn't that far behind US in these matters.

However, I'm unsure if the VWP for US people coming to EU also asks whether
the person was an enemy combatant in WWII. The questionnaires on the VWP
are... peculiar, to say the least.

~~~
jballanc
> Which ones have that been, and when?

Personally, I find Zurich and Munich do a great job of isolating the slog of
security from the rest of the airport experience. Yes, you still have to deal
with much of the same security theater as in US airports, but once you're past
that you can relax in a nicely apportioned environment.

As for overall feel, though, I like Turkish airports the best. Unlike the US
and EU, the security there is more than theater. They actually scan your bags
_before_ you enter the terminal (and, you know, stand in crowded queues with
everyone else and their bags). Ataturk's domestic terminal is something
straight out of the 80s, and its age shows, but somehow it's still more
relaxed and better laid out than most US airports. The Ataturk international
airport, on the other hand, and especially the Star Alliance lounge, is a
stunning environment.

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erric
Security theater at its finest. The TSA is failing 90% of the security reviews
for smuggling in weapons. How many of us would still have a job if we were
failing that often?

~~~
saas_co_de
The irony is that if there were a terrorist looking to create a maximum loss-
of-life event they would now only have to target the security screening line
and wound't even have to bother with getting on the plane.

~~~
ceejayoz
I've stood in a three hour TSA line at O'Hare and had this thought about half
way through. Rather uncomfortable.

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tempodox
An apt commentary. The Home of the Brave is no more. It has become the Home of
the Hysteric and the Paranoid, up to and including the POTUS.

~~~
beamatronic
Some trace it back to Clinton. He would have gone after UBL but was distracted
by the impeachment proceedings against him.

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dawhizkid
Travel hacks I live by: TSA Precheck/Global Entry (a must!), Amex Platinum
Card/Priority Pass for Amex Centurion Lounge/airport lounge access, T-mobile
for free unlimited international data/1 hour free Gogo in-flight WiFi, and
usually co-branded credit card for airline I fly with for priority boarding
and free checked bag when I need it.

Side note: Pre-check is getting more popular and hear Clear might be even
faster now.

~~~
Zak
Something really rubs me the wrong way about paying the government to mistreat
me less. It really seems to me like it was created to make sure that wealthy,
and therefore politically influential travelers don't get too upset about the
TSA and demand reform.

~~~
dawhizkid
It’s $100 for 5 years for both programs...I think anyone who can afford a
plane ticket could afford this if they wanted to.

If anything you’re agreeing to speedier service in exchange for reduced
privacy through greater surveillance on your travels.

~~~
Zak
Yet most people don't.

I don't think it's necessarily intended to discriminate by income, but I do
think the intent is to avoid political pressure to back off on general
screening procedures.

~~~
dawhizkid
Most people don't have TSA precheck because they don't fly enough to bother
doing it or don't know anything about it so don't research it further.

If you are rich you're flying in business/first class or have elite airline
status as it is, so you'll get priority screening regardless of whether you
have precheck or not. If anything the biggest cheerleaders for TSA precheck
are the airlines because speedier security means fewer people missing their
flight due to long security lines.

~~~
Zak
Priority lines gets you a shorter line. Precheck gets you a less invasive
screening procedure.

Priority lines exist because the airport, rather than the TSA controls the
lines. The airport tries to do what the airlines want, and the airlines want
people who pay them extra to have a better experience. This is arguably
broken, but it's not really the TSA's fault.

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AJ007
Am I the only one who finds vanishing leg room a larger disturbance than TSA
lines?

The big airport crybabies are usually those who expect weather or mechanical
problems to vanish by voice command. Unless you fly Spirit, I've seen minimal
problems with airline staff or TSA agents. Most are fairly friendly.. of
course this may vary by airport. I usually fly in and out of the same handful.

~~~
Zak
It's not TSA agents that are the problem, but TSA _policy_. Unless you pay the
TSA for precheck to abuse you less, the process is pretty invasive.

To give just one example, in Europe, passengers are not routinely required to
remove shoes.

~~~
c22
Last time I flew in the US (3 weeks ago) I didn't have to remove my shoes. The
security process was actually quite streamlined. The biggest indignity was
provided by Alaska Airlines, where one self check kiosk had run out of receipt
paper, causing a massive deluge of people to line up at the only human agent
available. (Other kiosks claimed you were already checked in and couldn't
reprint your boarding pass.) I, and I'm sure many others, alerted the agent to
the problem, but she was too busy servicing the growing line of increasingly
late passengers to do anything about the root cause. It wasn't even clear if
replacing the tape was her responsibility.

~~~
decebalus1
> Last time I flew in the US (3 weeks ago) I didn't have to remove my shoes.

That means either someone was not following protocol, they were running an
experiment or you were in business class. Shoes need to come off in standard
screening (1). Such anecdotal evidence means nothing. I for one had to take
off my shoes a month ago (a long with all other passengers) but I never had to
remove my shoes when flying inside the EU.

(1) [https://www.tsa.gov/travel/travel-tips/travel-
checklist](https://www.tsa.gov/travel/travel-tips/travel-checklist)

~~~
c22
I don't know if it was an experiment but there were signs prominently posted
advising all travelers to keep their shoes on. My companion also did not have
to remove her laptop before screening, but they did pull her aside to look at
it after the X-ray. There were no bins, passengers were expected to put their
phones and loose change into a pocket of their carry on, then I just walked
through a metal detector and it was done. The line was very long but moved
extremely quickly. There was a dog working the line, so perhaps it was an
instance of this: [https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-06-24/shoes-on-
fee...](https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-06-24/shoes-on-feet-laptops-
in-bags-tsa-now-waves-passengers-around-body-scanners)

~~~
glandium
I had the same experience at about the same time (3-4 weeks ago) on a transfer
after an inbound flight: no need to remove shoes, no need to pull out laptop.
That was however not the case for my outbound flight.

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mschuster91
I remember when flying as a little kid from Munich to London that little me
was allowed to sit on the pilot's chair - I believe my parents even have a
photo of it. Note, this was before 9/11.

~~~
linkregister
I have seen a child sitting in the pilot's seat on a U.S. domestic flight
while boarding a plane a few months ago. Before the plane is away from the
gate, there is probably no restriction.

Disallowing passengers access to the cockpit is likely the most meaningful
post-9/11 change to preventing aircraft hijackings.

~~~
tehwebguy
Sure but no change was even required. Once the public realized the intent
might be to use the plane as a bomb the attack vector became meaningless.

No one will ever hand the plane over again, even if the attacker claims to
have a bomb.

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burgerdev
A post about airport depression without a single reference to Douglas Adams?
Welcome to 2018, I guess.

~~~
throwanem
_Teatime_ has many fewer fans than _Hitchhiker 's_.

~~~
justinhj
I thought of this quote while reading the article:

It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the
expression "As pretty as an airport." Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly.
Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special
effort. This ugliness arises because airports are full of people who are
tired, cross, and have just discovered that their luggage has landed in
Murmansk (Murmansk airport is the only exception of this otherwise infallible
rule), and architects have on the whole tried to reflect this in their
designs.

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jack9
The intimation that the Trump travel bam, is somehow evidence of how airports
embody a national psychosis is a silly jab. Throwing out absurd
comparisons...what about the different classes of tickets at Disneyland? This
article is devoid of intellect and filled with musings.

~~~
noonespecial
Banning a whole class of people because some of them might do (or even have
done) bad things is an extraordinarily dangerous idea that can cause some
serious problems if it becomes considered fully acceptable.

It's also a perfect example of where this "psychosis" is leading us and how
its a much bigger problem than an extra hour at the airport spent playing
pretend.

~~~
verroq
You don’t want them in America anyway because their religion is largely
incompatible with western ideals and culture. Their treatment of women, lgbt
groups, free speech, for example are conflict with a harmonious western
society.

People don’t hate them for believing in their religion, the problem is that
they believe in a religion that openly calls for the death of cartoonists,
gays and jews or anyone that insults it. If you are one religion that
interferes with other people’s ability to practice their faith then that one
religion is the problem.

~~~
mLuby
>You don’t want them in America anyway because their religion is largely
incompatible with western ideals and culture. Their treatment of women, lgbt
groups, free speech, for example are conflict with a harmonious western
society.

You're talking about Christians, right?

~~~
dang
Responding to a religious flamewar comment with another religious flamewar
comment is exactly the wrong thing to do here, and will get your account
banned as well—regardless of how wrong and provocative any other user was.
Please read
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)
and don't post like this again. If you do, you'll see that the guidelines say
exactly what to do, and not to do, in cases like this.

