X-ray backscatter security scanners

[VeloVT]

We live in an age of paranoia...

Some people are paranoid about suicide bombers, and some people are paranoid about the government -- here's a comment from the above-referenced comment thread on Fox News' website:

The airport was the pilot project. Then come the trains, the subways, government buildings, public buildings, the library, the schools .... Each time it is an x-ray scan. Every individual will have many scans every day. The dose adds up. As a consequence, there will be many people who will become unable to have children. They will use fertility services, which the government taxes and regulates. The government will eventually insist on gene-designed babies, because the gene pool of the population at large has been too damaged by the scanners ... Brave new world!

I guess we each choose the version of reality that seems to us closest to common sense. It's astonishing how much this differs between us, though.

I really don't have any more problem with getting scanned at the subway than I do at the airport. If I had children, I would have no problem with the requirement to vaccinate them in order to enroll in public school -- and this is very much the same thing to me. Public safety, like public health, requires a critical mass of participation in order to be effective.