Keep terrorism at bay, use a GPS.
August 28, 2007 7:39 AM   Subscribe

If Hansel were alive today, he might very well get arrested and cause a panic. This is not the first time, either. When are we going to ban running clubs and make everyone safer?
posted by Bovine Love (49 comments total)
 
Running alone should get you arrested, because who knows who or what you might be running from or after? Arrest all runners.
posted by pracowity at 7:45 AM on August 28, 2007


The people marking the trail shouldn't be charged with anything, the people freaking out about it should.
posted by drezdn at 7:46 AM on August 28, 2007 [3 favorites]


drezdn: stop making sense goddammit, or we're going to have to raise the Alert Level to drown you out. Again.

Also, you gotta love spokesdrones: "You see powder connected by arrows and chalk, you never know,” she said. “It could be a terrorist, it could be something more serious"

Powder and chalk. Could be more serious than terrorism, you know.
posted by aramaic at 7:51 AM on August 28, 2007


The arrows might point off a cliff, then what would happen?
posted by anthill at 7:52 AM on August 28, 2007 [4 favorites]


... in large and friendly letters: "Don't panic!"
posted by homodigitalis at 7:53 AM on August 28, 2007


Similar to that "bomb threat" involving the LED Aqua Teen hunger Force logos, it's iniquitous to act like these people intended, or could possibly have forseen this completely irrational freakout and try to prosecute them on that basis. This is not what the law is for.
posted by Drexen at 8:01 AM on August 28, 2007 [2 favorites]


Obviously, terrorists can't run with those robes on.
posted by desjardins at 8:02 AM on August 28, 2007


I myself discovered Hash House Harriers via this AskMe thread not too long ago.
posted by Plutor at 8:04 AM on August 28, 2007


Uh, also.
posted by Plutor at 8:05 AM on August 28, 2007


On behalf of the United States, I want to take this moment to formally apologize to the rest of the world and say "I'm sorry." for our country having devolved into a quivering bunch of paranoid pussies.
Thank you.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:05 AM on August 28, 2007 [8 favorites]


This is not what the law is for.

On the contrary, that is exactly what the law is for -- to give power-mad freakazoids the opportunity to run amok with guns & expensive gear purchased from campaign contributors, and pin all responsibility on J. Random Citizen.

...meanwhile, the peanut gallery applauds their heroic freakazoids for helping defend Freedom & Shopping from those dastardly terrorists. Cuz you can't be too sure!
posted by aramaic at 8:09 AM on August 28, 2007 [1 favorite]


Here in Eugene, there was a panic involving a rabbit marking a trail with flour. This was during the anthrax scare. Then, when it was found to be just flour, pointed questions were asked about whether the flour was organic or not, the fear being that pesticides were being spread about.

But this, after all IS Eugene. . .
posted by Danf at 8:09 AM on August 28, 2007


To my US-based friends: the morons have taken over your country. The only available containment method is to sprinkle flour in the parking lots of tv-stations, city halls, white houses, etc., so they'll be to scared to leave the premises.
posted by signal at 8:09 AM on August 28, 2007 [1 favorite]


I want to second thorzad's apology to the world.

I also want to organize a flash mob in Times Square, where everyone brings a bag of Gold Medal Flour and tosses it with abandon.
posted by bashos_frog at 8:12 AM on August 28, 2007 [2 favorites]


It seems to me that anyone trying to cause terror with some nasty powder would be a bit more sneaky about deliviering it to cause maximum damage. they WOULDN'T SPREAD IT RANDOMLY IN A FUCKING IKEA PARKING LOT!!!!

Who needs terrorism, when we do a damn good job of scaring ourselves over absofuckinglutely nothing?
posted by notsnot at 8:13 AM on August 28, 2007


This is what gets me: "The sprinkled powder forced hundreds to evacuate an IKEA furniture store Thursday", according to MSNBC.
No, the police forced hundreds to evacuate. This is the equivalent to all the talk of a "hoax device" after the ATHF were suspected of being terrorists.
posted by creasy boy at 8:25 AM on August 28, 2007 [3 favorites]


The worst part is that the guy came back after seeing it on the news or something to tell them it was harmless flour, and they arrested him. Teaches him!
posted by smackfu at 8:28 AM on August 28, 2007 [1 favorite]


The rules have been crappified from top to bottom.

They (Ikea management, Ikea security guards, local cops, etc.) all overreacted because it was in their little handbooks: "If you see white powder, it's not your job to analyze it. Your job is to..." cause a panic in such and such a manner. Afraid to lose their shit jobs, they followed the panic-inducing orders.

And after wasting all of that money and time and looking foolish ("Uh, boss, we had to close the store all evening because there was some flour in the parking lot..."), they checked the crap rules again and realized they could charge the flour spreaders for the costs of the panic.

All you Americans, go get a bag of flour tonight and shut down the country.
posted by pracowity at 8:28 AM on August 28, 2007


signal: "To my US-based friends: the morons have taken over your country. The only available containment method is to sprinkle flour in the parking lots of tv-stations, city halls, white houses, etc., so they'll be to scared to leave the premises."

And with that, my next short story is born.
posted by Drexen at 8:36 AM on August 28, 2007


“It could be a terrorist, it could be something more serious. We’re thankful it wasn’t, but there were a lot of resources that went into figuring that out.”

It's amazing anybody gets anything done what with all the things out there that might be terror-inducing.
posted by rouftop at 8:38 AM on August 28, 2007


Remember the days when a white powder sent to you in the mail might be cause for celebration or when the the news story would have been at worst dismissed as a harmless prank?

I really can't say what has changed in the past 20 years, but the humorless stupids seem to be running the show, and I can't for the life of me figure out how we've allowed the most inept to control so much.

*sighs*

Just sit back and watch it all catabolize itself.
posted by quintessencesluglord at 8:39 AM on August 28, 2007


The upside of this is that it proves that actual terrorists just aren't that bright. Think about it, if just dropping some flour around a parking lot can cause Americans to piss themselves in fear, the actual terrorists could be doing stuff like this, but instead they try lighting their shoes on fire or something.
posted by drezdn at 8:43 AM on August 28, 2007 [1 favorite]


Better yet, we should ban flour. That'll teach those terrorist bakers.
posted by ranchocalamari at 8:44 AM on August 28, 2007


First rule of Running Club: No one talks about Running Club.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 8:47 AM on August 28, 2007


Better yet, we should ban flour

They're probably working on it. God forbid anyone be permitted access to raw chemicals & unprocessed food; you never know when someone might cook up a bomb with that vinegar, or discover a new drug in that so-called cilantro!

...I never trusted cilantro. Sounds all foreign-like. Even when they said it was the fuel-oil, I knew it was really the cilantro.
posted by aramaic at 8:48 AM on August 28, 2007


FEAR

By some estimates more people died in auto accidents, as a result of travelers switching from planes to cars out of fear, than did in the initial terrorist attacks.
posted by StickyCarpet at 8:50 AM on August 28, 2007


How come articles like this end with a quote from the congenital re-tard Mayoral spokeswoman, Ms. Mayorga?

“It could be a terrorist, it could be something more serious. We’re thankful it wasn’t, but there were a lot of resources that went into figuring that out.”

A fitting end would be: "When asked about whether common sense was used among the resources in figuring out the likelihood that a terrorist would mark arrows around an Ikea parking lot using sacks of anthrax," the Mayoral spokeswoman said ....
posted by Azaadistani at 8:50 AM on August 28, 2007


But I thought Osama liked Sweden?
posted by kigpig at 8:50 AM on August 28, 2007


There was a shopping mall
Now it's all covered with flour
you've got it, you've got it

If this is paradise
I wish I had a lawnmower

/Byrne it all down
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 8:55 AM on August 28, 2007


You know, when I ran with the hash house harriers and a few related clubs in Malaysia, back in the late '80s, we used cut up slips of office paper, not flour. Of course that's partly the beauty of running through a tropical rainforest, that paper didn't last on the ground very long.
posted by jrb223 at 9:06 AM on August 28, 2007


I would just like to point out to you people that flour is very very dangerous indeed, and we are lucky the terrorists aren't using it.... yet.
posted by dersins at 9:16 AM on August 28, 2007


Many Hashes switched to chalk or spray chalk after the anthrax deaths in 2001.
posted by probablysteve at 9:27 AM on August 28, 2007


Don't mark it off as harmless just yet, flour is known to explode...

When the biscuit bombers come, we'll be ready!
posted by 1f2frfbf at 9:32 AM on August 28, 2007


Yeah, I saw one article that said they switched back because the flour is more natural. Also works on grass / dirt trails.
posted by smackfu at 9:34 AM on August 28, 2007




I'm about to go ride a ferry, that terrorist magnet. I hope there's no flour.

I'll nth the apologies to the world for being a nation of pussies, cowering behind SWAT armor and machine guns.
posted by maxwelton at 10:26 AM on August 28, 2007


Also, how do you look in the mirror after showing up in your robocop costume and finding out you're there because of some spilled flour?

The finale of the chase scene in the Blues Brothers (just after they have their tax receipt stamped) has become the standard police response in Pussyland.
posted by maxwelton at 10:28 AM on August 28, 2007


I also want to organize a flash mob in Times Square, where everyone brings a bag of Gold Medal Flour and tosses it with abandon.

I'm in.
posted by Skorgu at 10:56 AM on August 28, 2007


wtf would have been "more serious" than terrorists? Were they afraid that the tiny mounds of flower might be the ashes of hapless shoppers zapped by alien ray guns? Did they think it might be Hitler powder?

wtf!
posted by aparrish at 11:09 AM on August 28, 2007 [2 favorites]


The upside of this is that it proves that actual terrorists just aren't that bright. Think about it, if just dropping some flour around a parking lot can cause Americans to piss themselves in fear, the actual terrorists could be doing stuff like this, but instead they try lighting their shoes on fire or something.
I dunno.
In the back of my mind, I can see Osama (or the Bilderbergs, depending on which conspiracy you prefer) carefully calculating that all they have to do is fly a couple of planes into buildings. Then, just sit back and laugh as the US dismantles itself from within.

Brilliant.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:59 AM on August 28, 2007


"Significant." - Tim Rhay, City of Eugene Oregon's Acting Park Operations Manager describing the likely cost of the HazMat team cleanup of more than 50 small piles of white powder believed to be flour found at the base of trees and light poles in Maurie Jacobs Park. According to a local news brief, Eugene City Officials speculated the substance may have marked the course of an unofficial run.


Talked to a guy about something similar happened out here a bit ago. Said the same kind of thing “You never know with terrorists.” Talked to some cops, same deal “Terrorists, you never know.” Talked to some local officials, same gist, same sage musing on the impossibility of knowing their motives or how and when they might strike and the need for eternal yet irrational vigilance.
Absolutely everyone is now an expert on counterterrorism. It’s one of the few things 9/11 actually changed.
I’d love to see an even more elite and more inaccessible field depending on experiance become universally mundane and fiction based.

Mr. PR: “As you know, anything can happen in space. Meteors. Alien monsters. Space anomolies. Gravity warps. Random bursts of radiation. You can’t leave the spacecraft. You need all these bells and whistles just to survive out there.”
Buzz Aldrin: “Yes, well, I’ve actually been in space. I set the record for extravehicular activity. I’ve never seen any ‘space anomoly’ or alien monster.”
Mr. PR: “Yeah, space. You never know what’s going to happen.”
Buzz Aldrin: “Actually you can very accurately predict a wide array of events down to the minutiae. The science is very solid on this.”
Mr. PR: “You can’t just screw around and go into space.”
Buzz Aldrin: “Well, there are strict mission parameters we follow and our course is plotted, so while the preparation is arduous, we can very easily go into space.”
Mr. PR: “Space, you can get hit at any time from any direction and BANG! you’re dead. Anything can happen in space.”
Buzz Aldrin: “Hello? Are you even listening to me? I flew with Deke Slayton, he said I saved the whole goddamn space program. I piloted the last Gemini mission. I was the second man on the fucking moon!”
Mr. PR: “Space, you never really know. There were a lot of resources that went into figuring that out.”

Thorzdad- that’d be an even better conversation (seriously Osama? They’re going to be afraid of dry milled wheat products? We’re not talking Lycopodium here right? Just because of a couple airplanes? Sheeeiit, by Allah, I’m in.)
posted by Smedleyman at 12:38 PM on August 28, 2007 [4 favorites]


Ummm... if you were trying to "deploy" a harmful powder to a populace, I don't really think you'd put it in neat lines on the ground. A salt spreader or sandblast gun would be much better.

A message to my fellow americans:

If you see an unattended med/large bag/container in a heavily populated site that is not part of structure/area. Say Something. Call 911

If you notice someone gingerly parking a truck/van and quickly walking away. Say something. Call 911 if it's by a monument/Transit Hub/etc. Call 311 if it's outside Frank's chicken shack.

If you see a flashing LED LiteBrite alien giving you the finger while simultaneously sprinkling powder at the feet of a guy in a track suit. GO HOME. You're tripping.
posted by Debaser626 at 1:36 PM on August 28, 2007 [1 favorite]


Thorzdad: "Then, just sit back and laugh as the US dismantles itself from within."

So does anybody here remember that Twilight Zone episode where some strange events convince people that their neighbors are "aliens" -- and then the entire country erupts in an violent, frenzied orgy of fear and hatred?

And then the real aliens just pat themselves on the back for being able to so easily subvert our fear-based society?

Yeah I was just thinking about that episode. Not that it means anything, of course...
posted by Avenger at 2:42 PM on August 28, 2007 [1 favorite]


I was just thinking of the Outer Limits episode where the three eyed aliens show up from Mars camoflaged as humans and are looking to take over and just before they do the antennaed aliens from Venus reveal that they’ve been in camoflage as humans too and have already taken over. Hmm...

*eyes Avenger suspiciously*

(although what you mentioned sounds a lot like O.B.I.T.)
posted by Smedleyman at 4:50 PM on August 28, 2007


That was the Twilight Zone, smedleyman.
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese at 5:00 PM on August 28, 2007


“It could be a terrorist, it could be something more serious"

Yeah. Like a police state.
posted by nax at 7:15 PM on August 28, 2007


Several Houston hashers are also cops or lawyers. Luckily, the Houston Hash is one of the oldest in the US, and has been using flour the whole time (it biodegrades!) and have made an effort to communicate with the police when there is concern the runs might cause some panic. In other words, they know us.

Hell, we've even run through the Galleria dropping powder, post 9-11, and on one run I hared, when we passed by a fire station, I managed to use my feminine wiles to convince the fire fighters to turn their hoses on the pack as they ran by.
posted by Brittanie at 10:22 PM on August 28, 2007


So...Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese, you’re not going to ask me if I want to see something Really Scary, are you?
posted by Smedleyman at 11:34 AM on August 29, 2007


Flour Power.
posted by sour cream at 12:04 PM on August 29, 2007


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