Imaginary Threats

Britain’s right-wing press are demanding for airport security to be radically upgraded after a passenger on an internal flight in Egypt managed to board the aircraft with an imaginary bomb. Using this non-existent device – apparently some kind of imaginary ‘suicide belt’ – the passenger was able to force the airliner’s crew to fly to Cyprus. “How could something like this happen? It’s exposed a huge gap in our anti-terror capabilities,” bellowed right-wing Tory backbencher Wilbur Firkscombe in his regular Daily Excess column. “Just how could a passenger by pass all those stringent checks for firearms and explosives to smuggle such a potentially lethal imaginary non-explosive device aboard a flight?” One security expert has attempted to quell fears of a rash of terror outrages involving imaginary weaponry. “It’s important to remember here that, in this case, it is inaccurate to say that the hijacker had an imaginary bomb, which would, of course, have been completely undetectable,” Dr Jerome Friggs, Senior Lecturer in Speculative Terror Threats at the East Grinstead Academy for Young Ladies told tabloid The Shite. “What he had was a fake explosive belt, Such things could and should be detected, at the airport, as if they aren’t, they could fool a non-expert into believing that they were real. In this case, however, as it consisted of several Frankfurter sausages taped to an ordinary belt, it really should have been detected and shouldn’t have fooled anyone.”

An anonymous source at the airport where the hijacker boarded the plane has taken issue with Friggs’ claims, pointing out that the man hadn’t actually been wearing the large sausages on his belt when he went through the security checkpoint. “He had them stowed in his hand luggage – last time I checked, sausages, no matter how large, aren’t on the list of prohibited items for air travellers to carry. They certainly aren’t classified as weapons,” the source told the Daily Norks. “He clearly taped them to his belt after he boarded. To be quite frank, though, even if he had been wearing them like sticks of dynamite when he came through security, there’s nothing we could have done, as they clearly weren’t dynamite.” Despite this, the source refused to condemn the crew of the airliner for treating the fake bomb belt as real. “As I understand it, those Frankfurters were close to their use by date – they could have gone off at any time,” they told the tabloid. “It was only when that British passenger, ostensibly posing for a ‘selfie’ with the hijacker, managed to take a bite out of one of the sausages that anyone was able to confirm that they were still edible and no threat to anyone’s health.”

But it is the imaginary, rather than fake, terror threats which continue to perplex Britain’s press and the right wing Tory backbenchers on their payroll. “Look, if one man can cause such mayhem with a single made up suicide belt, just think what chaos could have been caused if he’d walked into a crowded city centre imagining a dirty bomb!” points out Firkscombe in his column. “It’s a terrifying prospect and the authorities clearly need to crack down on these non-existent terror devices. I mean, it isn’t just this latest Egyptian hijacking, is it? Belmarsh top security prison is full of Jihadist types who were found guilty at secret trials of plotting to do things with all sorts of explosives, guns and toxins that they didn’t actually have, but the authorities imagined they might have been able to get hold of.” He dismisses liberal critics who claim that under current draconian terror laws there are already too many fantasists locked up in prison, with the authorities claiming that their imaginary terror plans are real. “I know, I know – all those bleeding heart liberals have condemned this business of secret trials with the defendants not being able to hear the evidence against them, let alone what they are charged with”, he says, “but if they are going to pose imaginary terror threats to the UK then imaginary justice is what they should expect.”

The real challenge, though, is how to stop the imaginary terrorists before they can cause chaos with their make believe weapons. “The problem is that all our security checks are geared up to detect explosives and firearms,” Friggs explained to readers of The Shite. “But these imaginary terrorists don’t have either – they just have the intent to cause mayhem and we’re doing nothing to try and detect that!” But how can intent be detected and measured? For Friggs it is a matter of observing external signals, such as body language and facial expressions. Firkscombe, by contrast, has far simpler solutions. “In the first place, these buggers are inevitably going to be foreigners – so you just have to focus on anybody foreign looking. You know, those with a touch of the tar brush, or wearing bedsheets. That sort,” he proclaims in the pages of the Daily Excess. “Then you just have to narrow it down to the most imaginative ones – so just detain any of these wallahs reading a book or magazine. That’s usually the sign of an overactive and dangerous imagination.”

In the long term, the Tory MP believes, the problem needs to be nipped in the bud. “It’s clearly the imagination bit which is the problem – these imaginary terrorists obviously all had their imaginations over-stimulated during childhood,” he opines. “We need to deprive children of all forms of imaginative stimulation – ban books, TV, video games, the internet, crayons, from anyone under the age of eighteen. Any child demonstrating imaginative tendencies should have them beaten out of them. I know, it sounds cruel, but believe me, it’s the only way we can be sure of being safe!” Firkscombe has roundly rejected allegations that he is trying to make an issue out of a non-problem, as so-called terrorists with only imaginary weapons cannot possibly actually kill anyone or destroy any buildings, trains or planes. “That’s really not the point, is it?” he spluttered in his column. “The fact is that once their make believe plans for fantasy terror campaigns have been exposed by the authorities, one can’t help but imagine the appalling carnage they would have caused – those imaginary atrocities are, frankly far more traumatic and terrifying than anything they could really do! That’s why we have to stop the bastards, before they bring us to our knees by forcing press and public alike to speculate endlessly about what they might have done if they’d been real terrorists.”