The Real Goal of Al Qaeda

It seems that people are terror-aware almost 24/7 lately. By altering the way average people (if the fashion industry can be considered as such) treat even trivial aspects of thier daily lives they did get exactly what they wanted. That some people's trivial concerns seem more trivial than others doesn't really change that fact.

Now if they had actually said "Forbidding make-up on planes is exactly what they wanted"...

Everyone knows the terrorist's main agenda is getting models to wear large sunglasses.

Please step back from that eyeliner, miss.

If we aren't free to have makeup on a plane, what freedom will they hate us for? I think we can expect an existential crisis among the terrorists as a result.

An inflated sense of self-importance is one of the hallmarks of the fashion industry. I still treasure a clip from the July 11, 2004, issue of the San Francisco Chronicle, which reprinted an article by Cathy Horyn of the New York Times. She was covering fashion shows in Paris. Brace yourselves for these two excerpts:

What [Raf] Simons did in an instant was to render the day, and most of the previous ones of the spring men's collections, obsolete. In 18 years of reporting on fashion, the last five at this post, I have stood up from only a handful of shows with a conviction that everything had been transformed.

Yeah, everything. Transformed. Wowie.

On his invitation was a random list of people and things that changed the world: sign language, Rosa Parks, the drinking straw, Taliesin West, Alan Turing, who cracked the Enigma code and hastened the end of World War II. Can a fashion designer make such a difference? Simons is bold to think so.

And Horyn is an airhead for reporting this seriously. Though I suppose I have to agree about the significance of the drinking straw.

A fun note: As one of the original computer nerds, Turing was notoriously lax about personal grooming. Of course, perhaps that was just his "look".

The terrorists got exactly what they wanted.

I suspect that that was said with tongue firmly in cheek. This is Jane magazine, after all.

And hey-- it's good to see somebody complaining about the TSA bullshit, instead of saying "I don't mind, it makes me feel safer."

This post in response to the quote makes some very good points. The principle "inconvenience" of the restrictions for me, at least, is that it is no longer possible to take a small, light bag to go in the overhead bin which contains everyone one needs, including one's makeup (hair gel, shampoo, etc.)-- unless, of course, you're willing to try and smuggle. I'm contemplating it.

For more security nails-down-a-blackboard comedy scroll to the bottom of this page and read some of the nominations for the stupid security awards.

Nominations are being taken for the awards for 2006 - there should be some absolute peaches this time around!

Actually, isn't the point that the word has lost its value with all the constant in-your-face focus on terrorism all the time? How many blogs have you read where the blogger links to some stupid culture war story and then makes some snarky remark about how the terrists "have won".

How many times have you heard the joke in conversation and laughed?

Hey, I would too, it's funny!

Sure, it may be a sign of self-importance in this case, but it may also just be a sign that the constant fear-mongering isn't working. The GWOT is a joke--literally.

Hey, while it is undeniably fashion hyperbole, don't dismiss it entirely either. Getting rid of makeup is a real goal of the islamic fascists / terrorists. Just look at the taliban.

Today they take your makeup, tomorrow they force you into a burqa.