from the the-most-vulnerable-place-on-earth dept.
Guests at several amusement parks in the United States will now be checked for weapons such as guns or bombs as they arrive, with several theme parks beginning the inspections on Thursday, December 17. Some operators cited holidays as the reason for the new procedures.
Universal Studios Hollywood, which has used metal detectors at its entrances during special events, has begun a "test" during which it is using them every day. Universal Orlando is using metal-detecting wands.
Disneyland has begun using metal detectors, as well as dogs trained to sniff for explosives. Toy guns are now banned in the park and are no longer being sold there. Costumes and masks are now prohibited for visitors 14 years of age or older. Walt Disney World has begun using metal detectors at its four parks in Orlando, Florida.
SeaWorld Orlando has begun using metal-detecting wands. The company said it is "enhancing security measures at all [its] parks for the busy holiday season."
Legoland in San Diego said it is "implementing additional security measures in preparation for [the] busy holiday season."
sources:
- WOFL-TV (Orlando, Florida)
- Orlando Sentinel
- KUSI-TV (San Diego)
- OC Register
- Metro
- NBC San Diego
(Score: 2, Interesting) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:26AM
I'm a big fan of roller coasters. Wooden, steel, hanging, you name it. My favorite have been the Millennium Force and Raptor at Cedar Point and both the Wolverine Wildcat and Corkscrew at Michigan's Adventure. The Mean Streak and Gemini are classics, and the Iron Dragon at Cedar Point is just plain fun. I admit my experience may be limited.
Isn't one more likely to be severely injured or killed in a roller coaster accident due to simple mechanical failure rather than terrirists?
(Score: 2) by davester666 on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:55AM
poor maintenance will be the most likely cause of your death/serious injury at an amusement park, because it's an everyday cost, so naturally it must be minimized.
(Score: 2) by el_oscuro on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:01AM
"Superman - Ride of Steel" here in Six Flags America is one of the most boring and scariest roller coasters I have ever ridden. The first part of the ride is cool with a nice 200 foot drop followed by plenty of air time on the next hill. Then a long straight track into a 70mph double-helix which lasts so long that it starts to get a bit boring before it is finished. Perhaps a single helix followed by a nice big overbanked turn would be more interesting.
Next, 300 yards of straight track followed by a bunny hop that pulls some serious negative Gs. I don't know how many but it was enough that a small necklace I had inside my shirt was ripped out and sent flying, catching on my ear at the last moment.
Several turns and hills later, we come flying into the station at 50+ MPH, with the station brakes catching us at the last moment before crashing into the other train in the station.
SoylentNews is Bacon! [nueskes.com]
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:19AM
Yeah, that bunny hop is at a nice angle. Relevant link [youtube.com]. Apparently youtube sent me to this ride next [youtube.com] at Six Flags Great Adventure (only been there once), which looked to be an interesting evolution of the hanging coaster. Heh, I'd probably try to troll that ride by flying like Nappa instead of the usual Superman/Vegeta/Kakkarot form.
(Score: 2) by skater on Tuesday December 22 2015, @12:48PM
I rode that once, and I was surprised at how rough it was. It was a cooler evening, so perhaps everything had contracted a bit, but it wasn't smooth at all like I expected from a steel coaster. (I've lived in the DC area 16 years now, but I've only visited Six Flags once. Drive by it almost daily, though.)
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:22AM
Off-topic? If you insist. The security theater disturbs me.
(Score: 2, Informative) by xpda on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:05AM
Yes, in an amusement park you're much more likely to be killed on a roller coaster, by a bee sting, or by a lightning strike than by a terrorist. And you're more likely to die on the way to the park in an alcohol-related traffic accident than all these combined.
We can thank over-reactive news and politicians for the ineffective and ultimately unsafe security theater spreading across the world in pandemic proportions. Be afraid!
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:39PM
And you're more likely to die on the way to the park in an alcohol-related traffic accident than all these combined.
Thank you. Theme-park rides are intended to be scary, but they're not dangerous. It's national news when they go wrong.
The companies know they stand to lose big if there's an accident. There was an accident roughly a year ago here in the UK, and it [bbc.co.uk] cost [bbc.co.uk] the theme-park company tens of millions of pounds in lost business.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:10PM
Honestly, I would have thought your chances of dying by terrorism would be higher than by roller coaster, though by terrorist *at an amusement park* seems pretty unlikely given terrorists have never attacked one that I know of. Roller coasters are really, really safe, and usually when people die it's because they intentionally defeated the safety mechanisms; sometimes there's maintenance problems but at the big parks this is pretty rare.
Your biggest chance of dying is, as you point out, in a car, especially because of drunks. This is why we need SkyTran and self-driving cars, and to ban human drivers. They've proven themselves completely unable to handle the task.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:22PM
This is why we need SkyTran and self-driving cars, and to ban human drivers.
If you're going to ban human drivers, are you also going to first make sure that all self-driving cars (and whatever else you suggest) are mandated to have 100% Free Software, or are you going to force people to use DRM-infested non-free proprietary user-subjugating software that probably also violates the user's privacy for both corporations and the government?
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:47PM
That sounds good, but honestly if it's a choice between privacy-invading software that tracks you everywhere versus the current state of affairs (drunk drivers everywhere), I'll take the privacy-invading software. You humans have proven yourselves completely inept at driving yourselves, so you need the privilege revoked. If you don't like it, well, I guess we'll see how things turn out at the voting booth. You humans haven't done very well there either, but at least there you're getting the government you deserve. If you refuse to vote for leaders who require 100% Free Software in self-driving cars (or open-source software in other important places like government IT systems, where the government should have access to the source code for everything they're using whether it's in-house or from an external vendor), then that's your own dumb fault.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:57PM
That sounds good, but honestly if it's a choice between privacy-invading software that tracks you everywhere versus the current state of affairs (drunk drivers everywhere), I'll take the privacy-invading software.
You'll take safety over freedom, and not only will you do this, but you'll force everyone else to make the same choice. That isn't acceptable.
You humans have proven yourselves completely inept at driving yourselves, so you need the privilege revoked.
You're exaggerating. It's often brought up in discussions about terrorism that cars kill more than terrorists, but even cars do not kill that many people in a world with 7 billion people.
If you refuse to vote for leaders
I don't refuse, but other people do. I don't see why this means my own freedoms should be reduced.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday December 22 2015, @07:28PM
You'll take safety over freedom, and not only will you do this, but you'll force everyone else to make the same choice. That isn't acceptable.
To you, maybe. So what? What are you going to do about it?
It's often brought up in discussions about terrorism that cars kill more than terrorists, but even cars do not kill that many people in a world with 7 billion people.
Bullshit. In America alone, about 30,000 people are killed every year in cars (and that doesn't include maimings and other injuries). It used to be worse, more like 50k; cars have gotten a lot safer (no thanks to all the Luddites), but that's still a huge number of people and one of the biggest killers of Americans today, probably only eclipsed by heart disease.
I don't refuse, but other people do. I don't see why this means my own freedoms should be reduced.
What should or shouldn't be is irrelevant. I want a unicorn that farts rainbows, but that doesn't mean I'm going to get one. And why should you be free to kill other people on the road anyway due to your own incompetence?
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @08:39PM
To you, maybe. So what? What are you going to do about it?
I don't know. What am I to do in the face of any oppressor, but to fight back as hard and as often as possible? Sometimes we win against moral thugs and sometimes we don't.
Bullshit. In America alone, about 30,000 people are killed every year in cars (and that doesn't include maimings and other injuries). It used to be worse, more like 50k; cars have gotten a lot safer (no thanks to all the Luddites), but that's still a huge number of people and one of the biggest killers of Americans today, probably only eclipsed by heart disease.
That's nothing in the grand scheme of things. Ultimately, the statistics don't really influence my opinion in this case, but I do think people exaggerate about how bad the situation really is.
And why should you be free to kill other people on the road anyway due to your own incompetence?
Straw man. It's not that I "should" be free to be able to kill people, but that you can't even ensure that these self-driving cars will respect my freedoms or won't be tools of mass surveillance, so you can vanish with your proposals to ban normal cars. How about this: If you oppose putting surveillance cameras in everyone's houses, then you're clearly saying that you should be free to murder people and plan evil terrorist plots within your own home. Accepting that freedom is more important than safety and that you are willing to give up some safety if you can have more freedom doesn't mean you *want* bad things to happen or think they should happen. What a ridiculous way to frame my position, but sadly not totally uncommon among authoritarians.
You want to increase mass surveillance (Let's face it: This will almost certainly be the result.) to achieve some amount of statistical safety, whereas I don't since I care about freedom. Self-driving cars are a good idea, but not if they do not respect our freedoms. If you care so much about saving people, then not only should you advocate that we make cars safer, but you should be trying to protect people's freedoms. The former without the latter is a total disaster.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @08:49PM
Fewer Americans may be dying due to cars than due to guns, for the first time in decades:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/12/gun-violence-car-deaths-charts [motherjones.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 23 2015, @02:34AM
About as likely as the self-driving car utopia.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @10:25PM
No, not especially due to drunks.
31% of fatalities have booze involved. http://www.cdc.gov/motorvehiclesafety/impaired_driving/impaired-drv_factsheet.html [cdc.gov]
Over two thirds are not. So, especially due to cars and people.
(Score: 2) by JeanCroix on Wednesday December 23 2015, @02:44AM
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:28AM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:30AM
Yeah, I was going to ask how this was new...
Took the grandkids to Disneyland a couple years ago and security was tight even then.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:31AM
About ten years ago my cousin ditched my Ka-Bar in a trash can at the entrance of a Six Flags because of the metal detectors. WhyTF he wanted to bring it with him and was too lazy to put it back in the car is beyond my understanding.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:45PM
What is a "Ka-Bar"?
(Score: 2) by Spook brat on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:02PM
What is a "Ka-Bar"?
LT: DR version in a single link. [lmgtfy.com]
long answer:
It's the nickname of the United States Marine Corps (USMC) combat knife, named after the company that first manufactured it. These days the Corps contracts out to many different manufacturers, but the KA-BAR knife company still exists and will sell you the original model if you've got ~$120 burning a hole in your pocket. With a 7 inch fixed blade it's nothing to be trifled with, and illegal to carry in some jurisdictions.
If my friend was carrying it and just ditched it in the trash instead of taking it back to his car he'd better be buying me a new one. Also, this is why I don't loan out knives...
Travel the galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms... And kill them [schlockmercenary.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday December 22 2015, @05:08AM
Ditto. I took my early teen sons to the Texarkana fair grounds (Texarkana Arkansas) all those years ago - and I haven't returned.
I will not stand in line to be searched before being permitted to pay the searchers to admit me into a facility. It's a damned shame that my fellow Americans have allowed themselves to be so thoroughly indoctrinated. There was a time when, if some rent-a-cop attempted to grope and fondle children as they entered a fair ground, the men would have dragged those rent-a-cops off for a much needed beating.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:25PM
There was a time when, if some rent-a-cop attempted to grope and fondle children as they entered a fair ground, the men would have dragged those rent-a-cops off for a much needed beating.
but if he does just one of (grope|fondle) it's okay
(Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:43AM
I'm a bit perplexed by it as well — because when I went to Disneyland in the late 90s after Columbine, they already had metal detectors at the check-in booths, were hand-searching every bag brought through the check-in booths, and had banned backpacks/duffel bags, food/water, and strollers other than the ones they had for rental.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:40PM
Six Flags Great America in Illinois has been doing it for years as well, it was a bit of a shock as I hadn't been there since 1999. I wanded down as every item of clothing I had on that day had something metal in it: my jeans, my boots, my jacket, my hat. When I had to go back to the car and return later I made sure to go to the same gate and get the guard from last time just wave me over right away and wand me quick so I wouldn't need to go through as much nonsense a second time. That and being way to expensive these days are why I've never returned.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @08:52PM
Right, the news is the changes the other operators are making. Six Flags has been using metal detectors since circa 2001, according to a couple of the reports about this story.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:33AM
Don't go to any of these places. Organizations which actively seek to destroy every last possible notion of privacy that we still have should be shunned and driven out of existence. It doesn't matter if the security provided is real or fake; living in a constant state of fear and having your privacy violated wherever you go is a much worse situation than some terrorist attack.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:43AM
Sadly, most Americans probably whole-heartily support this. Think of the children!!!
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:15AM
Or better yet because "you can't be too safe".
In another 30 years or so every last person in america is going to be living in a locked padded cell with a camera pointing at them because "you can't be too safe" (protip: yes you can)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:40AM
People like you whine about everything. If they didn't check, and there was a terrorist attack, then you'd be the first one to call for the government officials to resign.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:44AM
Nonsense. After the 9/11 attacks happened, I didn't beg the government to violate everyone's constitutional rights in the name of safety. It's not freedom advocates that call for the violation of our constitution and our rights, and yet you're lumping them together with people who do.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday December 22 2015, @05:20AM
Utter nonsense. I echo Anal's words, and I'll add that Americans in general have changed.
For all of my life, I've heard of hijackings. I watched them on the news. I watched the El Al hijacking unfold, just as I watched one after another hijacker commandeer flights to Cuba, and various other points around the world. We saw indoctrination at work all those years. "Cooperate with the hijackers, it's your best chance of survival. Few hijackers are willing to get violent, El Al was the exception, rather than the rule. Just relax, and go along for the ride."
On 9/11/01, some moderately brave individuals in the sky over Pennsylvania said "Fuck that!" and took out the hijackers. Everyone aboard the plane died, but that's what decent, honest men should have been doing all along - take out the god-damned hijackers. Sheepish Americans grew some balls that day, and put a stop to the intentions of a handful of terrorists. Had we, as Americans, done this all along, 9/11/01 never would have happened. We set ourselves up to be victims.
There have been other instances since then, when people on flights who felt threatened have subdued their fellow passengers. I salute each and every individual who stood up and took action when the shit hit the fan.
And, I only have contempt for those sheep who submit to authoritarians.
You actually get into line, nut to butt, and work your way through the queue, for the opportunity to be subjected to humiliating searches. You pay good money for the opportunity to be groped and interrogated.
Why don't you stand up on your own hind legs, and walk through this life with some dignity? I don't understand your species.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @05:27PM
Then I recommend you stay home in your man cave with your multimedia theatre and gun collection while the rest of us live our lives.
You can write your own obit: "He was a real man... didn't take shit from anybody. What a life to be proud of!"
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday December 22 2015, @05:34PM
Well, we're all going to die one day. What do you want on your own tombstone? "Groveled like a worm in the hopes of attaining immortality."
How about we do away with all this ineffective security theater, and just warn people, "There are dangerous people out there. If you meet one, you had better be prepared to defend yourself."
Again - praise for those Americans who decided that they would NOT be used as weapons against their fellow Americans, and killed their hijackers. Despite decades of indoctrination, they stood up like real men and women, and they were counted.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:07PM
while the rest of us live our lives.
But you're not living your lives, and you're not letting other people live their lives in peace. You're begging the government to violate the constitution and everyone's liberties so you can feel safe. You're being molested, groped, and surveilled by government thugs wherever you go. Some life that is.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:25AM
I'm sure they are thinking of the children... as in indoctrination. Hey kids Mickey Mouse is just going to search you for weapons because he really cares about you, totally normal! Not only will my kids not be visiting these prison parks, I also won't be buying any of their branded merchandise or movies. Security does not come in the form of theater and thought control.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:20PM
obligatory Penny Arcade [penny-arcade.com]
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:27AM
Really? This disturbs me further. I've never been to Disneyland, although I had thought I should go some day. Just a fan of Pirates of the Caribbean and The Little Mermaid.
I've had limited contact with Six Flags.
Is this really standard practice?
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:46AM
I've decided to stop going to hockey games here in Ottawa. This year the NHL decided they all needed metal detectors at the doors, which is bad enough, but I forgot all about this and went to a game with my family and I'd forgotten about it. They wouldn't let me in with a Leatherman Ps4 (I think that's the model), which has about a 1 1/4 inch blade. Ridiculous security theatre to help spread the fear.
I figure it's either stop supporting them and write a nasty letter or kill someone with a Bic pen to show how misguided they are.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:14AM
Heh, your variance in scenarios made me actually chuckle. I wish people would take the few seconds to figure out how useless the theatrics are, then maybe they'd start wondering why it is all in place.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @03:39PM
That's it, no more pens either!
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:51AM
One reason to go to these places: if you want to be a mass murderer. Have you seen the ferry into and out of Disney World? People packed like cattle.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:38PM
A metal detector is a perfectly reasonable precaution that I often see at sports stadiums. Extending it to amusement parks seems fine. It's an excellent privacy/security tradeoff to create a gunfree zone.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:42PM
Why is living in fear a perfectly reasonable precaution? It is only so if you don't mind living in a society where you are searched, treated with suspicion, and violated at every turn. But in that case, you're just a coward, aren't you?
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:22AM
I thought he was a Portland Police Bureau officer at first but no he was a rent-a-cop.
There's also a new security post near the entrance with some guy just standing there looking official. I had to walk up to him to peer at the store directory just behind him.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @04:29AM
What the fuck is wrong with Americans?! Armed security at Target stores? Methinks they need to focus on cyber security instead...
(Score: 2, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday December 22 2015, @05:20AM
Due to his inability to get the law behind IRS Section 1706 repealed - it only affects consulting software engineers such as Joe Stack and I, consulting architects and consulting electrical engineers - Joe Stack burned his own home to the ground then crashed his civil aviation plane into the six-storey Austin IRS building, taking the life of a man with seven children.
Of course the Internal Revenue Service convened a board of inquiry, it concluded that each field office should have one more security guard posted than was the case previously.
I AM ABSOLUTELY SERIOUS.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday December 22 2015, @05:28AM
About three years ago, I went searching for my Social Security card, and couldn't find it. That meant a trip to the Social Security office in Texarkana. Guess what? Armed security in the lobby. He lectured everyone who came in the building, "Turn your cell phones off, leave any knives, guns, or metal objects in the car, or leave them with me at the desk" blah blah blah. When he lectured me, I just stared at him. No, I did NOT reach into my pockets to remove those "prohibited" items. I stared at him like the god-damned idiot he was, and when he stopped blathering, I took a number, and turned around and sat in a chair to wait my turn. When my number was called, I had to talk through a service window to a "receptionist", then wait for someone to push a button to unlock the door, allowing me in among the cubicles.
I suppose a lot of terrorists are trying to infiltrate Social Security offices around the nation.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:46AM
And people wonder why the government can't balance a budget. Security theater is expensive.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Tuesday December 22 2015, @07:27AM
In South Dakota we have a gold star on our drivers licenses when you procure a birth certificate and a social security card. There is no need for those documents again when you renew your drivers license.
Half-assed guards are part of most US government buildings.
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:49PM
Was all of that the result of the "birther" thing?
(Score: 2) by hankwang on Tuesday December 22 2015, @10:50AM
The sentiment here is all about privacy invasion, security theater, and wrong priorities. In general, that's the gut feeling that I have; indeed, the chance of dying from terrorism in most Western countries is quite low compared to traffic accidents and other premature causes of death. However, the fact that it is so today is not a guarantee that it will stay so if you don't take extra precautions.
For example, I regularly visit Turkey, which has had quite a few terrorist incidents [wikipedia.org]. Basically, there are guards, metal detectors, and X-ray machines at the entrance of every shopping mall, airport, or other place where "rich" people come. Often, they will check the trunk or inspect the bottom of arriving cars with a mirror. I find it hard to convince myself that this is really just security theater when there was a bombing with 100 deaths in Istanbul, just a few weeks after I left from there. That's even though a fearing nation serves the present Turkish government.
The real solution against the undermining of the relative safety of modern society would be to take away the reason for the bad actors to attack the society. But it's not easy to erase the results of decades or centuries of (perceived) injustice. The one who does will get the Nobel Prize for peace.
Avantslash: SoylentNews for mobile [avantslash.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @11:29AM
It is security theater because it obviously doesn't prevent the bombings either.
(Score: 2) by hankwang on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:01PM
At least, they don't see bombings in shopping malls and airports... The question is whether the number of bombings is a conserved quantity: suppress it at one location, get it back somewhere else, or not. Well, the rich people (who may be better able to give the government a hard time) are safe, at the expense of some inconvenience when they go shopping. The poor have more privacy and a tiny bit more risk of dying in a bombing...
Avantslash: SoylentNews for mobile [avantslash.org]
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @06:15PM
The question isn't whether the security is effective or not (it's not). The question is whether you're cowardly enough to surrender your dignity and freedoms in the name of security (even if real) or not. If you are, maybe you should simply move to an existing police state.
Personally, I'd rather die on my feet than live on my knees. The US is supposedly "the land of the free and the home of the brave", so I would think more people here would feel the same, yet there is so much cowardice. Some people seem to have the ridiculous view that someone is immune to human nature just by virtue of being part of their government, so the people in the government would never abuse their powers or make mistakes. History shows just the opposite: When given massive amounts of power, people will abuse it, and this leads to oppression. Suggesting otherwise demonstrates an extreme ignorance of history. Thanks to this cowardice, we're going to have our very own full-fledged police state if this nonsense not stopped.
(Score: 2) by hankwang on Tuesday December 22 2015, @07:31PM
It's easy to be brave when you're sitting behind your keyboard. My brother-in-law did his (compulsory) military service in a region of Turkey where bombings of army bases with casualties were somewhat common. It does change one's perspective, even though it wasn't me who had guard duty over there.
Avantslash: SoylentNews for mobile [avantslash.org]
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Tuesday December 22 2015, @08:48PM
It's easy to be brave when you're sitting behind your keyboard.
It's easy to tell others you know nothing about they're all talk when you're sitting behind your keyboard. That's about as meaningful.
The thing is, after the 9/11 attacks and all these other attacks, I did not beg the government to infringe upon people's liberties, and I didn't beg all these companies to start violating people's privacy just so they can move about. That puts me above people who did. These accusations that people who advocate freedom would give up their principles in exchange for safety are baseless and misguided. Authoritarians are who you have to blame for these policies.
It does change one's perspective, even though it wasn't me who had guard duty over there.
It changes one's perspective only if what you care about is safety and not freedom. I value a free society where privacy and dignity are respected over a 'safe' (but not safe from government and corporate oppression, of course) bubble society where no one has any dignity and no one cares about principles or freedom.
I'll turn your first sentence back at you: It's easy to pretend to care about freedom in times of peace, but your commitment to those principles are only truly tested in dangerous times. People who would instantly give up their principles just because they're scared never really cared about freedom to begin with. To people who actually desire freedom, they are just fickle 'allies' in times of peace, and oppressors in times of strife.
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Tuesday December 22 2015, @12:26PM
Well, if amusement parks stop selling toy guns, I'm not sure where the kids will get them anyway. They were always the biggest pushers of those things.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @02:56PM
I bet you can still buy a stormtrooper blaster at Disney, though.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 22 2015, @09:05PM
No. According to the OC Register story:
On the radio I heard that a man carrying a toy light saber was turned away.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 23 2015, @12:39AM
Awesome, so then we can all expect future Disney films to be free of guns and violent scenes? If not then they're just a bunch of hypocrites...