• ArtieShaw
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    1412 years ago

    To be fair, after the attacks on 9/11 I heard a fair number of comments from people who were convinced their local high school football stadium would be a prime target for international terror rings.

    “Think about it, Becky. It’s Friday night and the whole town of Left Nube, Indiana will be packed in there. We’re sitting ducks.”

    It’s silly, but people project their fear locally.

    • @SARGEx117@lemmy.world
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      302 years ago

      At least the city I lived in was close enough to “primary nuclear strike” targets to be demolished by shockwave.

      Never mind the fact that that’s nuclear strike targets, not “Terrorist-hijacked-jets” target. Clearly people tend not to think rationally about these things.

      • @Cheesus@lemmy.world
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        32 years ago

        Are you between the two nuclear labs in the Bay area? Those always show up as top targets and people always brought it up

        • @nilloc@discuss.tchncs.de
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          22 years ago

          The Midwest is full of missile silos that are on MAD target lists. There’s possibly more legitimate fear that terrorists could target something in San Francisco or similarly popular places. Terrorists also want attention, so a place with lots of news coverage is better too.

      • @MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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        22 years ago

        Well, I HOPE most people think rationally, but the ones who are going to whine about the local sports match? … Yeah, agreed.

      • @SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world
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        22 years ago

        My dad pointed out to me as a kid that the city next to us would be a nuke target because it held the US strategic reserve of silicon carbide, a substance critical to grinding parts (e.g. making weapons).

    • @imapuppetlookaway@lemmy.world
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      212 years ago

      After 911 a woman in my city (Portland Oregon) called the police because she saw powder on the hood of her parked car - parked under trees that were shedding pollen. She though fer sher that evildoers were targeting her with anthrax spores or something. The police are required to respond to those calls with full bio-emergency gear, so it was a huge scene, road blocked off, police vans everywhere, people in full body protective gear taking samples of the “anthrax” from her car. The end result was a public announcement from the police asking the public to please use common sense before calling. The drama going on in people’s heads sometimes … yikes.

    • Flying Squid
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      62 years ago

      Dude, you don’t have to make up Left Nube, Indiana when the state has Floyd’s Knobs and French Lick.

      • ArtieShaw
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        22 years ago

        It is. And it has permanently entered our household lexicon.