Photographers vs. Thugs with Badges
February 26th, 2010In case you missed the latest step of a western democracy turning into a police state, here it is:
One of the annoying things about the new anti-photographer authoritarianism is that it generally targets users of large, conspicuous cameras; the last thing any terrorist would use. The only incident I know of in which a real prospective terrorist was caught (in Victoria Station, London, IIRC) involved the use of a phone camera… As anyone with an ounce of sense could have predicted.
The thinking of the thugs with badges undoubtedly goes like this:
"A real terrorist is almost certainly going to use as inconspicuous a camera as possible. But because it’s inconspicuous there’s basically zero chance of me getting in trouble if I miss it.
It’s extremely unlikely that the person with an SLR and a big lens is a terrorist… but it’s not impossible. And if he is a terrorist and I miss him I’ll get vilified in public and private.
Therefore, as long as there’s a non-zero chance of the person with the expensive camera being a terrorist, that person represents an infinitely greater threat to my job than a real terrorist with an iPhone."
Great Quotations
…there’s something wrong, somewhere, when mistakes happen as often as they do, without any visible and measurable positive effect in how the police actually protects us from the real bad guys.
— Jostein Øksne