I agree with your main point, and am sorry to nit-pick, but I think that it's important: how you feel doesn't, and shouldn't, have any effect on the policy. In fact, the whole phrase 'security theatre' describes precisely the phenomenon of making (easily mollified) people feel secure instead of being secure. I am not at all saying that you are in this boat (it sounds like you're not), only that I think the word choice is very important.
I 100% agree that my feelings should be irrelevant to security policies. But the precautions taken by the TSA are completely disproportionate to the amount of risk we face while flying. It's a total joke to say that it's anything but "security theatre". That feeling of security is really all we're buying with all that money and inconvenience.
I agree; but what I meant here was that praising a different set-up for making you feel more secure risks implicitly suggesting that this feeling is the goal (rather than at best a pleasant by-product), thus playing into the whole security-theatre game.
I agree with your main point, and am sorry to nit-pick, but I think that it's important: how you feel doesn't, and shouldn't, have any effect on the policy. In fact, the whole phrase 'security theatre' describes precisely the phenomenon of making (easily mollified) people feel secure instead of being secure. I am not at all saying that you are in this boat (it sounds like you're not), only that I think the word choice is very important.