system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
CMV: Airport security screenings do very little to stop deliberate terrorism such as the attacks of 9/11. They are a show put on to make passengers think something is being done.

The list of things you have to do in the airport security check line seems to get longer each time you fly: separate pre-purchased travel sized products into a plastic baggie and remove it from your suitcase. Remove your shoes, earrings, belt, sunglasses. Take all food and snacks out. Dump out water. Separate electronics into different bins. Prove that baby is drinking formula. At this point, people are basically unpacking their entire suitcases.

Meanwhile, for the low low price of $85 (for 5 years, but still), you can be fingerprinted and checked so you can go through the bourgeois line with TSA Pre Check. 

This cannot actually be preventing terrorism. Not only can attacks be done with nearly anything, wouldn't you just qualify for TSA PreCheck to do something crazy?

I think the efforts were put in place to do any or all of the following:

1) Put on a big show for passengers so they will feel like America is "doing something" about airplane terrorism.

2) Create a big hassle around carry-ons so people will check more luggage and make the airlines more money.

3) Create jobs.

4) Create an easy way to check people for simpler stuff that does cause issues, like liquor or drugs.

5) Create a way to separate people by social class (this is admittedly a stretch, but maybe rich people were sick of having to go through lines with the great unwashed).

I'm really looking forward to having my view changed, because I'd like to go through the TSA line with a little less rage.
gpt
This is a really tricky thing to talk about in that it isn't possible to quantify all of the things that didn't happen because of X or Y factors.  _Deterrent_ is very difficult to quantify as it is and nearly impossible when you are talking about events that are particularly rare (as terrorist attacks are).

On a somewhat related note, we do know that home alarms don't actually do much to stop home invasions - response time by the police is too low to actually catch a thief in the act.  However, the _sign_ in front of your house is a very effective deterrent.  If a thief is choosing between a house with a sign advertising an alarm and one without, they will most likely pick the house without because there is less probability of hassle.

In the case of the TSA, they certainly didn't make it _easier_ for terrorist attacks to happen with planes.  The hassle is the deterrent effect here - when looking for an attack vector, a would-be terrorist will probably pick a different target because the odds of getting caught are higher due to all of that security theatre.  

Now, does that justify all of the things the TSA does?  Absolutely not - they have gone way overboard in the name of security theatre.  However, that doesn't mean that some of the things they are doing are not helpful - we'll just never really be able to quantify how helpful they might be because if they are working, we'll never see attacks.