Alarming Airport Security: How Much is too Much When It Comes To Passenger Safety?

[dr. hfn]

The Transportation Security Administration is on the job. It's been several months since full-body scanners were installed in Reagan National Airport in D.C., but since then they have continued to spread around the country. The most recent location is Tulsa, Arizona where TSA employees may now look through passengers' clothing to see if they have anything objectionable underneath. Few privacy objections have been raised by those subjected to the revealing scan, probably in part because a manual frisking, which could never be invasive, is offered as an alternative, and in part because the TSA has been so very reassuring: "The images produced by that scanner are not pornographic at all,' a Tulsa screener said. 'I don't look at them as people. I look at them as a thing that could have something on it. And so the "things that could have something on them" continue on their way, not so much concerned that their Fourth Amendment rights have just been grossly violated, but displeased that the process took so long.

As C.S. Lewis rightly said, "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for 'for the good of its victims' may be the most oppressive." It's a sad day when the TSA depersonalizes security, no longer are we people to them, but just "things", and will be treated with the respect and attention "things", rather than people, deserve. But just think of how much safer they're making us all! Don't think of it as stealing our freedoms so much as granting us the liberty to be herded, photographed in the nude, and above all else safe in our chosen mode of transportation. Don't worry, Big Brother always has our safety and best interest in mind...And to reiterate the best for last, the quote from an employee of the state, in reference to the citizens- "I don't look at them as people."

[pacelli]

I don't look at THEM as people either, I look at THEM as things to be avoided.