I've always noticed announcements and posters in the subway system around New York with their "See Something, Say Something" ads which is noble in theory but I can't help but wonder if all this does is encourage more profiling. I understand people call the police for dumb shit all the time but you see posters of bags laying around, shifty looking individuals, and other things with absolutely no backstory and all it seems to do is create a little more paranoia. What really makes me question this is a local radio ad that plays out a short conversation between two guys on a train that have spotted someone that looks suspicious because he a) has been looking around but hasn't looked at anyone, b) is fidgeting in his pocket, and c) is by himself. There's no assumptions, no "well maybe he's just having a bad day and needs to get somewhere", no nothing, they just whip out the phone and call up the police. That's pretty crazy profiling if you ask me especially considering all three of those things, even together, are normal behavior. Now this kind of thing can be good in the right hands but man you know there's a bunch of people who will use this because pretty much everyone is shifty to them.
Topic: "See Something, Say Something" and similar: Useful tool or empowering paranoids? (Read 1218 times)