Yes, I've had similar experiences recently and similar thoughts. Crossing land borders in Asia is more stressful than it was a few years ago. Lots of redundant security theater and biometrics everywhere. Of course, China is on another level to everyone else. At the immigration booth, your conversation with the official is now translated and subtitled in real time on both sides. And face ID is now so universal in China that I suspect the fingerprinting has become an afterthought. Everyone is being filmed and tracked pretty much everywhere. Not just cash but even ticket numbers are now redundant. Everything is attached to your personal ID and cameras decide whether you enter public buildings, train stations and so on. The day their government decides to really abuse all that power, they're in deep trouble.

In my experience the border thing is clearly worst in Asia, but with the exception of China it's mostly just tiresome theater.

By contrast I crossed into the Schengen zone from Turkey this summer and was surprised by how little security there was. But then I noticed the police all but dismantling a bunch of heavy goods vehicles in their search for illicit migrants. That was absolutely not security theater.

PS. This subject got me thinking. I've seen a ton of borders because I like to travel by land. Different regions of the world definitely have different priorities at borders. In Asia it's drugs and contraband. They care what's in your bag. In Europe and North America, it's you they care about: why you're here and when you're going to leave. In police states like China, borders are a golden opportunity to harvest a ton of data on suspect individuals. In much of the rest of the world, Latin America for example, borders are mainly just an employment scheme, bureaucracy for its own sake.

According to my dad, 9/11 pretty much changed air travel for good. Everything afterwards became extremely strict.

Where are you experiencing this ? I have not experienced personally this in South America or Europe. It is usually just the immigration who look at the passport and let you through once you say you're visiting or whatever

I guess it probably depends on where you're going. I went to the UK earlier this year, and my experience was mostly painless. Landed in Manchester, and they basically had self-checkout customs. I scanned my passport and looked at a camera once, and that was it. It was actually more of a hassle and more invasive coming back home and getting back into the country.

I grew to be mweh about PhylosophyTube, but they did a good entry video into that discourse: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyzd_a6vLWY

9\11 and other attacks turned security measures to 11, it's hard to roll them back and you'd be criticized if you want them to.

Laugh in European

Fifteen years ago I was traveling to the US. I had a stop in Germany and Chicago before I reached my destination. Every time I was on a ground I was questioned, I had to fill several documents, I had a full body scan and I had to power on all my devices and perform some basic tasks, e.g. I had to take a photo with my camera and show it to the agent.

Where the fuck did you go, Arstotzka?

Oh no. You wanted to enter another country and they wanted to know who you are in case you do something illegal while there?!?! How very 1984.

This is a country that doesn't even allow you to sell to used electronics stores without a residency card so that you can't scam them.

This seems like a really dumb gripe to have that you had to enter immigration in a other country. Complaining because you got detained in Singapore or China cause you complained about the government or handed out some VPNs on a USB (I did the delays were fun) is commendable but this seems like yelling at shadows.