Friendly Skies
When NBC Nightly News covered the bombing of the Istanbul airport, they reported that airports were “soft targets,” which are places that are easy targets for small terrorist groups due to the fact they are filled with people. I’ve never been to an airport, but I’ve seen them on TV. They are always crowded and busy. Maybe the only way to guarantee our safety is to take that away. The future airport will be fortified like a maximum security prison.
You thought airports were crazy now, wait until simply entering the perimeter is like going through a border crossing checkpoint. Once you’re through, you are nowhere close to being in the clear. Men with their hands on there gun holsters tell you to get out of your vehicle. They help you get out your luggage, watching you for any sudden movements, and after you have unloaded your luggage, they have you get on your knees, where they then handcuff you and put a black bag on your head, before having you enter a buggy. Your car is put in a special depot. Don’t bother coming in a taxi. Your driver will get a random screening every time. You wait for your plane to board in a room with no windows and a big mattress on the floor. You have a TV with basic cable. The door is hidden within the metallic walls, and if you have to use the bathroom, you make the universal sign of needing to use the bathroom, hands over crotch. All the handcuffing and head-bagging weakens a bladder.
A voice will come up telling you and your family to form a circle in the center of your waiting room facing each other, and covering your eyes. Agents like ninjas come in the room and bag you, while telling your family to keep their eyes covered, or else.
You are lead to the bathrooms through the terminal, you can feel how empty it is now. A TSA agent of your gender accompanies you in the bathroom, then bags you after you dry your hands. Not washing your hands is considered bio-terrorism. You are bagged and brought back to your families waiting room until your plain boards. The voice will tell you to cover your eyes and form a circle. When they TSA agents are in your waiting room, and the room is secure, you are bagged and handcuffed. The bags have a fresh-out-of-the-dryer-smell and the dark of the bag is calming.
On the plane, there are more air marshals than passengers. Any movement you make alerts suspicion. Even the first-class passengers are scrutinized. I hope you weren’t afraid of flying before.
Please know that all of that is speculation done in jest. That — everything I talked about is a dystopian novel. But how can we guarantee safety? I don’t think stigmatizing and targeting 1.6 billion people because of radicals. Even though, it is well-documented that radical Christianity and Christian terrorism exists, it is mostly Christians who perceive Islam to be dangerous as a whole. It’s a fear that was reinvigorated by the Orlando shooting. Of the last three mass shooting in the USA, the other two were done by full-blooded Caucasian men, who did not have ideologies, but mental impairments. Dangerous ideologies that call for one to harm themselves or others, is suicidal/homicidal ideation, with the only difference being one is called dangerous ideologies and the other is called suicidal/homicidal ideation. If your ideology has you making a bomb and blowing up yourself and everyone around you with it, you are unhealthy.
The bombing in Istanbul was orchestrated by three men. Two were at the international terminal. One was in the parking lot. During the chaos, according to witness Sue Savage, people were led to prayer rooms, walking a floor smeared with blood and covered in glass.
Terrorism has been escalating in Istanbul over the past year. CNN reports a car bombing in Ankara that claimed 37 lives back in March. This attack was the work of a “Kurdish militant group.” Four people died in Istanbul the following week when a suicide bomber detonated in the street. The Kurdish military group killed 28 in Ankara in February after targeting and bombing military vehicles. Of the attacks in Turkey this year, only one was linked to ISIS. In January, a bombing in Sultanahmet Square killed 10 German tourists. When you look at this information, what happened today seems inevitable, and the issue is that the Turkish government was not on guard in order to prevent it.
If the pattern of recent attacks is any indication, the strategy of these groups that are targeting areas in Turkey are doing so in public areas where they are guaranteed to cause the most havoc, fatalities, and damage.
