This is entirely true. This country, her people, the media, etc., all have created this odd lack of understanding of risk and risk management. We see stories on the evening news that claim, "You WON'T EVER carry a lighter in your pocket again after seeing this!" (in regards to the 4 or so lighters that explode in a given year), and we have people pushing to make cars more "pedestrian safe" (to the tune of lower gas economy and $1000s more in costs) or to have special bumper-mounted cameras to avoid backing over small children (added cost to a car: about $1500 to prevent something like 100 deaths a year) We've reached the point where the perception of risk far outweighs the reality of it, and I've even heard it taken so far as to say, "If this would save even ONE life, it's worth it!"

Yet people keep eating awful food, smoking, being couch potatoes, etc., and do nothing to actually mitigate the risks that really matter, instead worrying about air crashes, getting killed in an elevator accident, having their plane hijacked, etc.

That's why so many people buy the admittedly poor, largely window-dressing security measures that are in place today. "Anything to make us safer!" is Joe and Jane Q. Public's motto these days, it seems. The media fed this, calling 9/11 "this generation's Pearl Harbor" and talking up a "war on terror" as if everything we do is part of a battle to make us safer. It's probably a facet of the innumeracy of our culture as well, but I simply don't have a good solution to change those perceptions.

I don't think we even necessarily need to change them to bring about sensible, effective security measures, though.