Don't Squander Public Trust on Bullshit

a tragedy of the public emergency system commons...

At 4.50am local time today, this statewide emergency alert was sent out to every cellphone in Texas:

I don’t know who Seth Altman is, nor do I care. Why? Because Seth Altman’s offense took place in Lubbock, Texas. I live in Austin, Texas. Four hundred miles away. What I do care about however is the misuse of emergency alert systems and public trust.

Sending out a screeching alert to 30million+ people over 250 million square miles in the middle of the night should only be used in the absolute DIREST OF CIRCUMSTANCES… circumstances like “Texas is under threat from hurricane/chemical leak/nuclear weapons, seek shelter now!” It should never be used for something that’s utterly irrelevant to 99.99% of people.

Why? Because the public’s trust in government emergency protocols is already hanging by a thread, and in order for those protocols to work when we really need them, they will need to be received and listened to. Instead, Texans by the hundreds of thousands are now turning off their phone’s emergency alerts, possibly forever. Why would anyone with a life to lead leave them on and risk getting their sleep disrupted over personally inconsequential events hundreds of miles away?

Such an outcome could be truly dangerous for Texas in the long run. If and when a real major emergency strikes, we will no longer have this important tool of public awareness or coordination. And that’s just the second order effects! There are likely going to be some excess deaths today as a direct result—there are 30m+ people in Texas, many of whom are in weak cardiovascular health. I would not be surprised at all if hospitals report an spike in cardiovascular events today. Not to mention an increase in road accidents; Texas is a notoriously driving-heavy state, and few things are worse for safe driving than sleep impairment.

So I hope the local government takes a long hard look at its alert-pressing finger. We all know the lesson of the Boy Who Cried Wolf, exhausting his village with his over-zealous cries. Well this time the village is thirty million people. Heads need to roll.