There are solutions for the 51% attack situation. When the fix needs to be implimented it will be. Gavin and others have had the solution ready for awhile now. The whole 51% thing just makes good press, it's all about selling fear, thats why you never hear that a 51% attack would be noticed immediately and the fix would shut the attack down almost immediately making all the attackers blocks invalid. To the normal citizen Bitcoin user it would be a small "hiccup" and banks have big "hiccups" all the time and no one really complains. Banks even close on the weekends and are getting hacked/fraud/ID thefts daily.