Those plastic knives that Geoff pointed out are indeed terrifying.
On the point of the ridiculous restrictions at the airport, I disagree them on the basis that less than two minutes thought would allow someone intent on harm to smuggle any manner of things on board. Whereas the people disadvantaged are those carrying drinking water, toothpaste etc on board. Who really thinks the underpaid jobsworths on security would detect one of these filled with over 2 litres of kerosene? or one of Geoff's plastic knives in a forearm sheath made of foam rubber that feels like real flesh? And those are two just off the top of my head, I am sure the loonies have hundreds more.

As a real example of how arbitrary and idiotic the restrictions are, I was travelling with an ex (a current at the time :-) ) and she accidentally put her make-up bag in her hand luggage. it had 3 sticks in it like fat cocktail sticks (something to do with toenails) which were duly confiscated. The bag had a mirror in it which was cracked although still in place. The longest shard was about 4 inches long but the bag was given back to my gf. Which would you rather be stabbed with, a tiny slightly pointy stick or a razor sharp 4 inch piece of glass!

Or, back to the original poster, which would you rather, a whack on the side of the head with a belt with a very solid buckle or a poke with a small piece of plastic. To my mind, the belt is more "dangerous" than a plastic sgian, but it is not on the list.... yet.

The only people who are going to spot stuff like the "beer belly" and so on are people highly trained in spotting suspicious behaviour and have commensurately high salaries, not people on minimum wage who have little or no training and are reading what is and isn't allowed off a list. A cynic might say that all the extra security at airports is not to protect people but to keep em panicked, but that may be going a little far down the political line......