Airport Pasta-Sauce Interdiction Considered Harmful by Bruce Schneider - Essay Example

Good day. This letter is a response to the editorial “Airport Pasta-Sauce Interdiction Considered Harmful,” which was writter by Bruce Schneider on September 18th of last year. I would like to state that although he ultimately has a point in that airport security may still be lacking in efficiency, I beg to differ in his reason for saying this. He mainly attacked airport security because of a personal experience in which his bottle of pasta sauce was confiscated; because of this, it seems that he committed a fallacy in creating his argument against airport security. Ad Misericordiam is the fallacy he committed, which means appeal to emotion. How did he do this? His argument is based on how people feel whenever something of theirs is being confiscated by airport screeners, calling the act a nuisance and exemplifying the feeling of annoyance all throughout the editorial—even stating that the act of confiscation only “hurts innocent people” and is “a waste of time.” I believe that this is the wrong way for him to have argued against the confiscation of certain classes of objects, like his bottle of pasta, as even though he put in valid points, it still seemed like he was just mainly ranting about his experience, which left him infuriated. Also, it seems that he attacked the effectivity of the airport screeners based solely on the pasta sauce incidence, in which Schneider was certainly not trying to smuggle anything on board the plane that will or can be used for terrorist activities. Because they made a mistake this time and it caused Schneider to become irritated, he wanted to let everyone else feel whatever he felt—hoping that they will agree with him. Hence, he manipulated the readers’ emotions as a way of putting forth his argument for a more efficient airport screening process that will only identify and confiscate those that poses real harm However, what does pose real harm? This is my main point in arguing against Schneider. Colognes, hand sanitizers and other forms of liquid may be used to form a bomb. First, they may just be disguised as one of these common items and then later when they are on board the plane, terrorists can assemble bombs that can cause the lives of many. Furthermore, anything can be hidden in a bottle of pasta sauce, for instance. Very small parts that make up a bomb that can blow up the entire plane can be disguised in there. Do airport screeners have the time to look thoroughly inside? Moreover, will the pasta sauce still be of any use once they are done sifting through it? The answer is no. And so, what can they do to make sure that nothing dangerous gets on board a plane? They confiscate them. And they have let the people know about this so that what they can do is just to not place these items in their carry ons. Does it not make sense? If there is one thing September 11 taught us, it is to be extra careful and wary of people. Even a pregnant woman may be a terrorist as pregnancy can be used as a perfect disguise for her to be trusted by the people around her. After what happened almost 8 years ago, we should know by now how desperate they are to wreak terror and at what lengths they will go through to achieve their extreme goals. So I suggest that if we want to be safe from these people, then we just cooperate with airport security as they know what they are doing. Their job is to keep us safe and I believe that we should just let them do their job. Explanation I have edited my letter based on the teacher's comments. Thankfully, there was not any major revision needed. I just created two paragraphs from a long one; separated my last sentence to make the effect more dramatic and the impact more felt; and I added two short quotations from the article being responded to. The two short quotations that I included, I believe, captured the way that the author, Bruce Schneider, vented out his frustration after his pasta bottle was confiscated by the airport screeners. He was clearly angry and thought of himself as a victim—one of the “innocent people” that was “hurt” by the confiscation of Class Two objects, which is a “waste of time.” These phrases are usually used in anger and they involve a certain kind of frustration for one to be able to say that something is a waste of time or that something hurts innocent people. Here, one can see how Schneider views what happened to him as some sort of crime that has to be done away with—something which he suggests at the end of the article. I believe that I have stated my thoughts on the article eloquently—using simple words that people can understand, yet incorporating a vocabulary that can be taken seriously. Because of this, my target audience, which is varied as they are travelers of all kinds and from all walks of life, can relate to what I am saying. I hope that through this letter, they may become more patient with airport security and that they may appreciate more the difficult job of the screeners that many, like Schneider, have come to hate. Not to be so confident of myself, but I think that I can place myself high on the grading scale, maybe an A or a B+ as I think I have meticulously completed the requirements for this assignment. I have also included two quotations, which is the only requirement missing from my previous letter. Read More