[hummusandsushi]

The name for this effect appears to be the "Preparedness Paradox" [1]. The effect where people attribute the minimal or reduced harm due to some problem to the problem not having been that serious, instead of attributing it to the essential work performed by other people to prevent the worst disaster.

A very funny depiction of this effect is in the hilarious episode "Charlie Work" of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia where the titular Charlie Kelly works tirelessly to have their bar pass health inspection, only to have the other main characters shrug and say "But we always pass health inspection".

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preparedness_paradox

[noduerme]

See also: Absence of airline terror attacks in the US since 9/11/01.

[AnthonyMouse]

Nope, there is only one single thing that has prevented that since 9/11, everything else is security theater and BS.

On 9/10/2001, the assumption was that if someone was trying to hijack a plane, they were planning to ransom the passengers as hostages, so you should let them take over the plane so the hijackers don't hurt the passengers who fight back.

As of 9/11, the assumption is that they want to fly the plane into a building and kill everyone on it, so if someone tries to hijack a plane, everyone on the plane knows to fight them to the death with suitcases and shoelaces and now you can't hijack a plane anymore so there is no point in trying.

[BoorishBears]

I agree 9/11 bred a lot of security theater, but I also don't buy the "one single thing" stopping terrorists from hijacking a plane is fear of a battle with passengers.

Pre 9/11 an attempted hijacking would "just" be a harrowing tale (because of your own reasoning). Post 9/11 even an unsuccessful attempt would create an overwhelming wave of fear, panic, and paranoia for the very same reason you argue people would be willing to fight to the death.

We just had two terrorist attacks this week and it's already falling off the news cycle: I don't think that'd be the case if the public had been given flashbacks to 9/11.

[AnthonyMouse]

> Post 9/11 even an unsuccessful attempt would create an overwhelming wave of fear, panic, and paranoia for the very same reason you argue people would be willing to fight to the death.

There were unsuccessful attempts. Shoe bomber etc. -- passengers and flight staff stopped them.

[noduerme]

I was just talking about the "preparedness paradox" that the parent was referring to. Whatever reason you attribute it to, heightened security or more vigilant passengers, the fact that it hasn't happened means we can't prove that it wouldn't happen in the absence of either of those things. Both arguments are counterfactual, so people begin to take it for granted that "no further work was required to prevent fill in the blank from happening."

[smegger001]

And you know locking the cockpit door now. Hard hyjack a plane when you cant access the controls.

[AnthonyMouse]

Eh, that's probably more of a trade off. The door is typically going to be unlocked during the flight anyway so the pilots can get their meals and use the head, and then you're creating a risk that a hijacker gets into the cockpit and locks the door behind them.

Whereas it's already pretty hard for a hijacker to access the controls after the passengers kill them.