'Both cars and cigarettes are more dangerous than terrorists'

But terrorists haven't really won until they make us think about it all the time and act noticeably differently.
Denmark.dk reports on the latest Danish study into the threat of terrorism. Denmark has an ongoing military commitment to Iraq significantly more than Australia (the Danes have been partners in the 'coalition of the willing' from day 1 as has Australia) and without the distance and island isolation that so much protects Australia they have very sound reasons to be alarmed about potential and predicted terrorist attacks. In fact Denmark was singled out in a video threat after the London tube bombings. I walk through the underground Town Hall railway station every day and have accepted the sense of risk on the basis that it will not force me to change my approach to living in the City of Sydney. I ask - why don't we conduct practical and informative research like this - rather than the garbage diet fads on the tabloid magazine TV shows...??

Terror expectations have little effect on daily life. Nearly half of all Danes expect a terror attack. Few, however, are changing their daily routine

although nearly half all Danes expect a terror attack they don´t change their daily routine
Danes have apparently resigned themselves to a life that includes terror. Despite polls showing that nearly half of all Danes expect a terror attack in the near future, only a small amount have actually changed their behaviour.
In a recent poll taken by Catinét Research for Ritzau, an overwhelming 93 percent of respondents said they were not changing their habits as a result of terror threats.
For philosophy professor Ole Thyssen of the Copenhagen School of Business, the attitude shows that we live in two different worlds.
'The one world is our common world, which is created by the mass media, and where we hear about terrorism. The other is our own day-to-day, where terrorism doesn't play a big role and where one wouldn't actually be able to do much about it anyway,' he said.
Thyssen said that personally, he had accepted the risk of terror, but that he wasn't going to allow himself to be frightened every time he saw a forgotten plastic bag on the pavement.
'Both cars and cigarettes are more dangerous than terrorists. But terrorists haven't really won until they make us think about it all the time and act noticeably differently,' he said.
Thyssen also pointed out that even this news article, in a way, added fuel to terrorists' fire.
'If these things are constantly in the news thanks to Ritzau and TV News and all the other mass media, then that keeps alive this hysterical situation, in which terrorism is on the screen, and in which we are hypersensitive about a cardboard box sitting someplace where it shouldn't, leading us to call the police,' he said.
/ritzau/