Israeli-Style Behavioral Profiling in Airports is Superior to the American Tech-Based System

My opponent in her last round made many assertions. I will only respond to those assertions where my opponent actually shows why something is a good point for the Israeli system or a bad one for the American system. By my count, there were only four such statements.1. Mormons, Catholics and Jews are not trying to blow up the worldNo further evidence was given by my opponent, this was just an assertion.Try telling that to the IRA and the Munich bombers. This website describes in detail how the Mormon scripture supports terrorism: http://www.i4m.com.... John D Lee (Mountain Meadows Massacre) was, before 9/11, among the most famous American terrorists. The fact is, Catholics, Mormons and Jews are as dangerous as all people.The implication of that statement is, of course, that Islam is trying to blow up the world. Let me fill you in. Even the most extreme fundamentalist Muslims don't want to blow up the world. There is no mandate in Islam for blowing stuff up, and indeed Islam preaches that people should respect each other and God's creation. That is why this kind of polarising hate-speech is dangerous. It creates the false impression that the enemy is the excluded group. In fact, both the included and excluded group could, in theory, be the enemy. That is why vigilance is a virtue. Just because the IRA once bombed, doesn't mean Catholics are all terrorists. Just because some terrorists call themselves Muslims does not mean all Muslims are terrorists.Let us take an extreme example. Buddhist monks are not particularly well-known for committing terrorism. But that doesn't mean everyone who boards a plane wearing Buddhist monk robes is not a terrorist. People may join Buddhist orders for all manner of reasons. I might be insane and want to hijack a plane out of mental illness. I might want to take revenge for the Chinese occupation of Tibet. Or, of course, I might want to take revenge for the atrocities committed by Israel against Palestine, as Al Qaeda professes. Because most states have freedom of religion, religious profiling is impossible until they invent the belief-system-mind-reader. Even then, Christians can be just as moved to commit terrorism as Muslims, who are again equally susceptible to the idea of becoming a terrorist.What distinguishes a terrorist is not their beliefs, but their use of terrorism. Profiling won't tell you their beliefs, but even if it did, that wouldn't be of any help. Therefore this assertion is a barefaced lie.2. The implementation of the American system sucksMy opponent notes many security handlers are high school dropouts with little training. Then security firms do it better. This is irrelevant.What we are debating is the relative superiority of the American and Israeli systems, not the people who administer those systems. It doesn't matter who does the screening, for we are debating how they should do it. Israeli airports use much more sophisticated bomb-protection systems for their airport security staff as well, but that doesn't mean their security screening system is superior. I am all for enhancing security at the bag check - so long as the bags are actually checked. Whether or not they do is the question. The same thing goes with my opponent's praise of the Israeli model's use of military personnel. The army can, in theory, use either model, and therefore this is not the subject of the debate.3. Feelings can compromise safetyJust because a system is unbiased doesn't mean it panders to the feelings of certain groups. I wonder if my opponent would argue against the American declaration of independence - "all men are created equal" most certainly did buff the feelings of black people, after all. But these feelings are the product of equality and impartiality. So let us actually address the question - can impartiality compromise safety?My answer is that impartiality compromises safety less than any bias ever can. The reason why fairness is so effective is that it targets 100% of terrorists, not just those terrorists that conform to my opponent's stereotype. In New Zealand, all our aircraft terrorist attacks have been committed by Africans (well, ok, one African). Nobody would have anticipated that, because no African country or network actually has any problem with us. One lady just randomly decided to take out her problems on a whole bunch of innocent passengers. If we had used the Israeli model at Nelson airport, she would have not been caught. If we had used the American model, she would have been caught.The same thing can be applied to the United States. Is Paul nervous about flying or does he have a bomb? Of course people will say it's the pre-flight nerves. When Mohammed Atta swiped his frequent flier number as he boarded the jet that he would smash into the twin towers, the guy at the counter became convinced it was the former. I don't blame him. But that's the true danger of profiling - it relies on feelings towards particular religions or ethnicities. If feelings compromise safety, then your model is empirically less safe. But by making all people go through a stringent screening process, nobody can slip through.4. Israel hasn't had a major hijackingThere are two ways you can hijack an Israeli plane. Either you hijack an inbound flight. In this case, foreign security forces will stop you taking your bomb wherever you take off from (almost everywhere else in the world follows the American model). The other option is to take an outbound flight. In this case you either are an Israeli or a foreigner. If a foreigner, you would have been stopped on the incoming flight taking the bomb in. Therefore all Israeli terrorists must be Israeli nationals taking outbound flights. Given that the sale of bomb-makeable materials is highly controlled and restricted in Israel, due to the threat of smuggling by Hamas and others, making a bomb to take on a flight would be much too difficult without escaping the notice of Israeli security. Therefore any such domestic terrorists must use a non-bomb weapon, such as a knife.That a country with one of the highest military populations per capita, where all citizens go through years of indoctrinating military service, with a population of only 7.5 million, has not yet had a major hijacking from a domestic citizen is not totally surprising. Countries of comparable size with no military service to breed patriotism also have had no terrorists. So how do they do it - is it the army or the highly advanced technique of asking "how are you?" out of formality and then choosing on a knee-jerk reaction. The answer - I don't know. Neither do you. You can't claim your answer is correct unless you can discount all of the other possible alternatives, which you can't.You see, there are literally thousands of possible reasons why Israel hasn't had a hijacking. One thing that is certain, though, is that given the unique circumstances of the country with extremely stringent monitoring of inbound flights, Israel is not in a terrorist nexus. Their geographic location near the bases of terrorist groups makes them no less a centre of a terrorist nexus than Cuba was in a capitalist nexus during the missile crisis.ConclusionMy answer to my opponent's question about security lines is simple - if they both lead to the same plane, both are equally unsafe. I don't want to board a plane administered by either shoddy agents or a shoddy system. Both lines will let through terrorists. This debate isn't about the agents, it's about the system. So let's make this a relevant scenario by making the security personnel the same people. In this alternative, I’d go for the line that logic dictates will catch all the terrorists, not one that bases its whole case on a single data point without evidence for causation. Wouldn’t you join me?My opponent has failed to provide a compelling case for the resolution. The motion falls.