there is little if any evidence to show that they actually make us any safer
I'd argue that they don't. A friend of mine was writing a paper titled How to hijack a plane with items you bought in the duty free, though he never released it. In the book Emergency, Neil Strauss mentions conceiled blades in credit cards, ceramic hair clips and other items that various people he talked to bring on to planes as "emergency weapons". I heard from a friend about someone who brought drugs through security by having them in a bag of peanuts or something, which he was eating on his way through (you probably can't always get away with conceiling items like this, but maybe..). If you really want, you can bring all kinds of prohibited items on to planes.
I'd argue that they don't. A friend of mine was writing a paper titled How to hijack a plane with items you bought in the duty free, though he never released it. In the book Emergency, Neil Strauss mentions conceiled blades in credit cards, ceramic hair clips and other items that various people he talked to bring on to planes as "emergency weapons". I heard from a friend about someone who brought drugs through security by having them in a bag of peanuts or something, which he was eating on his way through (you probably can't always get away with conceiling items like this, but maybe..). If you really want, you can bring all kinds of prohibited items on to planes.
So, no, the security does not make us any safer.