THE PENDULUM
WEDNESDAY. NOVEMBER 17. 2010//PAGE 11
ditorial
First careful consumption,
tlien cultural carelessness
The novelty of most things
promote the early care of them
— that new iPhone, that new
technological advancement
that seeks to “propel business
ventures to new levels," or
those new safety measures
enforced at airports. When
objects are new, we want
to take care of them. When
good, succinct procedures are
enforced, we follow them to
the rule.
With time, though, the
sparkle wears off. And when
those items that were once
hot commodities become
commonplace, safety
measures are forgotten and
consciousness slips.
In a recent New York Times
article entitled, “Long Live
Lady Luck,” author Thomas
L. Friedman touched on the
short-lived luck Americans
are enjoying on the security
front. In the past year, we have
thwarted five terrorist plots,
all of which could have had
disastrous results.
Last December, Umar
Farouk Abdulmutallab, an
A1 Qaeda-inspired Nigerian
attempted to detonate
explosives in his underwear
on a Delta flight to Detroit.
The aircraft was carrying 278
passengers. Faisal Shahzad
crafted a bomb that he placed
in his 1993 Nissan Pathfinder,
attempting to detonate it in
Times Square on May 1.
After being arrested 53
hours after the attempt,
Shahzad was taken into
custody by U.S. customs at the
JFK airport, and boarded a
plane to Islamabad, Pakistan
— a situation that exploited
gaping holes in U.S. airport
security. Placed on the no-fly
list on May 3, investigators lost
track of him and didn’t know
that he was planning to leave
the country. Fortunately, they
escorted him off of the plane
while it was still at the gate.
The month of February
brought a guilty plea from
Najibullah Zazi, an Afghan
immigrant who set off a bomb
in a New York City subway near
the date of Sept. 11. He was
searched by the Port Authority
police who were acting on
behalf of the FBI’s request and
still got through to the city,
hoping to detonate a bomb in
the middle of packed trains
on the 1, 2, 3, and/or 6 lines to
cause maximum casualties. He
was caught only after making
it all the way to Denver. Most
recently, a cargo plane coming
from the United Arab Emirates
and Britain on its way to an
LGBT-friendly synagogue in
Chicago was found to contain
bombs wired to cell phones
and concealed in the cartridges
of printers.
Our airline security
measures are only becoming
more innovative, and scanning
procedures increasingly more
invasive and controversial. So
why are we still missing the big
picture?
Major telephone companies
have placed warnings (in the
fine print, of course) about the
recommended usage of their
devices.
At first, cell phones were
used sparingly, in case of
emergency. Their functions
served only a few purposes,
dial and communicate — but
now, with the addition of
WiFi capabilities, QWERTY
keyboards and touch screens,
we have changed they way we
live.
We walk with our heads
down, engrossed in the
information available at our
fingertips. We bump into
each other, we are distracted
when we cross the street, we
hit pedestrians while we text
behind the wheel. We can’t tell
time without our devices, more
often than not, we rely on it
to get us up in the morning.
We sleep with our phones and
can’t imagine losing them.
Yet, with all of the
importance we place in our
mobile devices, we hold them
close to our faces, with only
a thin, permeable membrane
separating them from our
brains. The link between cell
phones and cancer has been
researched since cell phones
were available for public use.
Nytimes.com’s ‘Digital
Domain,’ a piece written on
Nov. 13 asked, “Should you
be snuggling with your cell
phone?" Radiation specialists
are up-in-arms about
Americans’ lack of caution
when interacting with their
mobile devices.
“Legal departments of cell
phone manufacturers slip a
warning about holding the
phone against your head or
body into the fine print of
the little slip that you toss
aside when unpacking your
phone. Apple, for example,
doesn’t want iPhones to come
closer than five-eighths of an
inch. Research In Motion, the
manufacturer of Blackberry,
is still more cautious: Keep a
distance of about an inch," the
article says.
Do we really know what
we’re doing?
Currently, a presidential
commission is speaking out
about the mindset behind the
Gulf oil spill, one it said is
indicative of a growing issue:
big corporations with their eye
on the bottom line.
In an editorial written by
the New York Times on Nov.
14, “The April blowout on the
Deepwater Horizon was not
some unfortunate occurrence.
It was the result of a series of
bad decisions by companies
less concerned about safety
than about finishing a project
that was over budget and 38
days behind schedule.”
The way we consume and
use products has much to do
with who we are, which values
we hold aloft and who we want
to be.
Be diligent, Elon students.
Decisions loom at every corner
and repercussions do, as well.
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