thoughts on 'aiming for the head'

[seldear]

The news that the odds of my getting shot in the head have increased is not particularly cheering.

In the coming six weeks, I shall be travelling through major airports, wearing a backpack, and possibly running to get to my flight gate before it closes, leaving me stranded. That this may get me shot in the head is definitely not a happy thought.

Granted, I'm Asian, and not Middle Eastern, but my skin is definitely olive and my hair is black - and who's going to look that closely if they think I'm a threat to be taken out? Even the fact that I speak good English might not have an impact - after all the London bombers on July 7th were people who'd been bred in England. I might very well be one of the same ilk.

And as for "reasonable basis'' - well, who defines 'reasonable'? The man with the gun, right? The one who feels he has the weight of care of all the people in the public space on his shoulders. And, hey, they were wrong with the guy in London who got popped seven times in the head.

I'm very aware that this is a silly line of thought. In all probabililty I will make it back home without having my head blown off by a security-nervous, trigger-happy cop; but I'm still going to feel bloody itchy in the back of the neck every time I go out with my backpack.

Comments

[wiliqueen.livejournal.com]

You also gotta love that they are (or at least were, as of press time for the current Newsweek) claiming that the procedure was coming from recommendations from Israeli security forces, who of course oughta know since they've been dealing with this sort of thing for ages.

Except for the part where Newsweek asked an appropriate Israeli official about it, and the response basically amounted to "Um, no, they're on crack." *rolls eyes*

[angst-angel.livejournal.com]

Eek.

[alliesings.livejournal.com]

Meep! I'll be thinking of that tomorrow morning while I'm standing in the airport with my shoes off being metal-detected.

[hwcarnage.livejournal.com]

When police with guns say "STOP" you stop, then you don't get shot

and the man who kept running in london was followed from a terroist's house under survielance and then shot, Unless you're hanging out with know terrorists I wouldn't be worried ;)

[elaran.livejournal.com]

=/ I know. bah. You'll be fine.

[cailetr.livejournal.com]

yeah ditto on the advice about not running when the police say 'stop'. simple duuuuuh here.
and if it helps, I asked an actual police officer and they have been given no such order here. Dunno what officers supposedly have been, but it's not a general everyone do this type thing

[suds-from-aus.livejournal.com]

At least your female. I mean, there's nothing really been said on this topic much, but my impression is that it's mainly men involved in the actual acts of terrorism and mainly men who are targetted as perportaitors of such acts.

So sometimes society's inequalities have a downer for women and sometimes they have an upper.