The idea of having to go through security everyday for free meals sounds unpalatable.
Personal story: Bringing liquids to airplanes is not allowed in Iran. I remember on our flight back from Shiraz, we brought about 8 liters of rose water, orange blossom water, etc. with us. The security saw it in the screen and asked what the liquid was. "Herbal water", I said. He nodded and called, "Next". Didn't even open the bottles to make sure.
Also many people bring back several liters of water from the holy Well of Zamzam[1] in their flight back from Mecca. The record I've heard of was 40 liters.
Last time I was there, after handing my bags over I got called to the inspector's room. They'd x-rayed my bags and seen a cigarette lighter [1]. I have no idea how they recognized it as such, but they pointed to the area in my bag where it had been seen, and asked me to open the bag and remove it.
On another flight, we were all waiting in line to check-in, but the agents hadn't shown up. Somebody gave up on waiting, and just left their bags sitting in line - this while the recording about unattended bags was playing (yes, they've got that in China, too). It was funny to watch everyone in the line studiously ignoring the unattended bag, for fear that they'd shut down the terminal while calling the bomb squad, and we'd all miss our plane.
[1] I don't smoke, but it's in my first aid kit for sterilizing a needle.
it gives people the illusion that they're safe even though the actual incident which prompted the creation of the TSA and DHS has been ridiculously under-investigated and official conclusions' are full of holes.
Security wasn't unpleasant, but it took a while, there was a long and slow moving line. We had to discard lighters and show passports, but the latter is par for the course in China. It feels like the Chinese are slightly more overbearing with foreigners, which helps, since there's a huge language barrier.
We where lugging a flight case of cymbals, which got quite a lot of attention and laughter from the operators going through the x-ray.
So, same question, and this time really think about it: you are capable of keeping an eye on a limited number of potential threats, you can never completely disprove that any individual means you harm, but you have to look as carefully as you can at the most plausible threats in the time you have available. How suspicious is my behavior, and what evidence would it take to convince you that my threat is negligible? What about the idea that you might personally be blamed if you cleared me and I later turned out to be a terrorist: does that affect your calculations? If so, is that in the best interests of the airport, or just you personally?
That assumes that on-scene guards ask questions of the subject before reporting observed suspicious behavior (which may or may not be the case, and is even less likely the case in the event that the "guards" that observe the behavior are automated face/gait/etc. recognition systems looking for unusual patterns.)