Airport Security

In a couple of weeks, my family will be going to Walt Disney World for a vacation. We’re all very excited and anxious about this holiday, but the new airport security process is weighing on our minds. The potential of being put through the naked photography or the invasive groping has us worried.

Two years ago, when we made our first family vacation to WDW, we drove in our minivan. It’s a twelve-hour trip, including time for breaks and meals. That’s a pretty long time to keep young boys entertained in an enclosed environment. Plus, in order to get to the destination at a reasonable hour, we have to leave home at an unreasonable hour.

Last year, we chose to take a flight to Florida. From home to WDW resort is less than 3 hours of travel, (1.5 hours on the airplane).

Over the past several years, (post 9/11), I’ve traveled through airports many times across the U.S., and once out of and back into the U.S. The security procedures were simply putting bags and shoes through the x-ray machines, and walking through a metal detector. Other than the annoyance of having to take off and put back on my shoes, it’s not a big deal. Even last year, with the family flying, this was all we had to do. The full body scanners existed, and we saw them in the airports, but they were just inert machines off to the side, unused and almost un-thought of.

When we were setting up this year’s vacation, we decided to again fly for the convenience. We made this decision, and bought the tickets many weeks ago, well before this new security procedure was announced. Full body scanners or invasive pat downs didn’t even come to mind before we were financially fully committed to the flight plans.

We’ve discussed this issue, and we’re going to rely fairly heavily on the idea that the TSA is only picking out 1 in 10 to 1 in 20 people in the security line for this new procedure. The odds of anyone in our party being pulled into this is not high, so we may not have to deal with it at all. We’re going to the airport with this hope.

Here are the issues I have with this situation:

Taking naked pictures of random travelers is wrong. Police can’t do this to random citizens.

Invasive groping of random travelers is wrong. Police can’t do this to random citizens.

The TSA personnel taking and viewing the naked pictures, and performing the invasive groping are not doctors or nurses or any other kind of professional – they are basically just glorified mall cops. I don’t mean to insult the TSA personnel, but it’s just a fact. Police officers have professional training and even they are not allowed to frisk someone without at least reasonable suspicion of a problem. And they aren’t allowed to force a strip without strong reasons. Yet the airport security can strip and grope citizens just randomly picked from a crowd?

I do not believe that the pictures taken by the scanners are secure. The TSA says the ability to save and/or print the images has been deactivated/turned off. It’s a computer system; the ability can be turned back on, the block can be circumvented, or the program hacked. Hell, photos of the computer monitor can be taken with a secondary device. I will not be surprised if a year from now images from these scans start turning up on the Web in some form. It is inevitable.

Picking random travelers from the security line does not make air travel safe. It might prove that 5-10% of the travelers in that line are not a danger, but that leaves 90-95% of the flight still in doubt. If I, a family man on his way to a family vacation, gets pulled to go through the new screening, that may make the person in front of me and behind me feel safe with my presence, but what about me feeling safe about them? If one in ten people are put through the new process, are we supposed to feel 10% secure?

If the security personnel were pulling people of suspicion to go through the new process, then maybe something could be said about it making flights safer. But pulling random travelers, law-abiding citizens who have given no reason to be suspect, and have any number of plainly apparent reasons to not be a terrorist -– that’s just wrong.

Some people raised a lot of ire about the idea of police in Arizona being allowed to ask about citizenship status from people they are already interacting with in a law-enforcement situation. Why aren’t those same people raising ire about the TSA stripping and groping random travelers who are simply legally travelling from city to city?

I do not want anyone to take naked pictures of me or my family. Personally, I would submit to the pat down, this once, just to move on to our vacation. But I will not let someone pat down my child without a damn good reason – not just because he was random passenger #10 in the line. We’ve taught our children that the only people that should ever touch them is their parents and their doctor. Airport security guards are neither.

If this new procedure – the full body scanners and the invasive pat downs – are still in place next year, we will not fly to Florida. And if we can’t fly, we may not go to WDW at all. Airlines and tourist destinations take note: The government overstepping its bounds, treading on citizens’ Constitutional rights, will hurt you.

To restate my basic premise: taking naked pictures of random travelers, and invasive groping of random travelers IS WRONG. It is wrong morally, ethically, socially, and Constitutionally. Some people don’t have a problem with being photographed naked or being groped – fine for them. That doesn’t mean it isn’t wrong as a blanket policy for everyone.

We don’t give up our Constitutional rights when we buy an airplane ticket. Especially when the security process changes after we purchase the tickets.

Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

No one can honestly say that taking naked pictures or invasive groping of random travelers — who have not broken any laws, and have not given the security personnel any reason to suspect them of being a threat — is not an unreasonable search of one’s person. Especially with no warrant based on probable cause.

Edit after posting: Anderson Cooper 360 on the TSA screening. I hadn’t seen this specific information and video until after I posted my rant, but it gives a thorough report to back up what I’ve said here.

Bullgrit