The Visceral Response To The TSA

[GrpCaptMandrake]

I fully understand the highly-charged, emotional response people are having to the current airport security outrage. Truly, I do. It's no fun to get touched without inviting it. That's why the Common Law in Olde Engelonde established the tort (and the crime) of battery. Most people believe "battery" involves being the recipient of a significant physical touching, like Smokin' Joe Frazier laid on Ali in 1971. It doesn't. A "battery," in its purest form, is "an unconsented-to touching of an insulting or provoking nature." Those ancient lights of the law understood that mere touching could set off bloodshed among semi-barbarians.

I also understand that a great number of people are outraged at what they perceive to be a violation of their Fourth Amendment rights.

Some (using the FoxNews style book here) might even object on Fifth Amendment grounds.

In short, there's a ton of outrage going around, visceral outrage, as I referenced in the title. Visceral means "gut," of course. Our response is gut-level and, by definition not cerebral, not born of intellectual rigor or examination. There are a lot of reasons for that. One reason might have to do with the fact that we, as Americans, are among the most prudish, most puritanical, most sexually hung-up people on the planet. We don't want our "privates" (see that? we call genitals "privates" because we're too hung up to say "scrotum" or "penis" or "breasts" or "vagina")touched because we have hundreds of years of inbred puritanism reminding us how "dirty, Dirty, DIRTY" we are, how "utterly FILTHY is the body of sinful humankind." (No, I won't attribute the quote. Just wander into a fundie church sometime this week and you'll likely find someone opining in that direction).

Some of this TSA business reminds me of the response of Dr. Laura when she got caught in her "nigger-nigger-nigger"-fest. Remember? She said she had to stop broadcasting in order to "regain" her "First Amendment rights?" Of course, anyone with even a modest comprehension of the First Amendment realized she hadn't been deprived of them, right? Most on our side understood, I hope, that the First Amendment applies to governmental suppression of speech, and as such, her departure manifested a great deal of heat, but not just a whole lot of light.

Like I said, some of the TSA business reminds me of that. Here we have folks like the guy from California saying "If you touch me, I'll have you arrested." For what, Perry Mason? Battery? When you go to board the plane, you consent to regulations relating to what you may and may not carry aboard. As such, having consented, there can't be a battery. Well, Matlock, maybe they're violating your Fourth Amendment rights, right? Wrong! The Fourth Amendment in its pure form is quite starkly austere. It doesn't have a lot of weasel room in it. That's what courts are for. Long before September 11, 2001 was even a twinkle in (you pick: Bin Laden's, Bush's, The Illuminati's) eye, the Fourth Amendment had been significantly eroded by so-called "good faith" exceptions (See U.S. v. Leon) and zones in which one had varying degrees of expectation of privacy. One has, for instance, a MUCH greater expectation of privacy in one's own home than in one's car. One has an even lower expectation of privacy in the airport. Sorry. No Fourth Amendment issues here.

OK, let's try the Fifth Amendment, Clarence Darrow. How would that work? Let's see: I have a right not to incriminate myself via having the BOMB/GUN/KNIFE/BAG OF RAMP JUICE AROUND MY WAIST x-rayed and revealed? Shall we take it as read that that one's a non-starter?

So where does that leave us? It leaves us, or at least me, remembering once more that the last time I wanted to be President of the United States was about age six, when it was a tossup between that, astronaut and cowboy. I certainly wouldn't want the job now. This outrage, which, I admit, leaves me feeling queasily like it's being "managed," is President Obama's biggest Kobayashi Maru incident to date. It is an unwinnable situation. It is unwinnable in large part because the right-wing drives messaging in this country to the point that the White House couldn't message "FIRE!" in a crowded firehouse. Witness the fact that the corporate ForProfit Media is on this like a duck on a junebug. Witness the fact that it only got "legs" right after the mid-term elections. Witness that it's happening at a time when it's managed to completely overshadow the right-wing assault on the START Treaty.

At any rate, Obama is damned-if-he-does-and-damned-if-he-doesn't. I recognize that, even though, as a liberal, I'm largely frustrated with a number of his positions.

That's my question: what would we have him do? It's all well and good for us to watch clips of George Carlin saying "I think flying should be MORE dangerous, goddammit," but do we really think that when it's our daughter flying home from college, or a husband leaving on a cross-country business trip? Do we? Are we that politically jaded?

What would we have him do? What would we have him do, understanding that WHATEVER he does will be declared creeping FascIslamUnism because he "has a deep-seated hatred of white people"? What would we have him do? Is it better to have something in place and work on it, and deal with it as adults, or have a squealing, tea-baggin', puritanical hissy because someone patted down our hoo-hoos and ding-dongs whose only intent in so doing was to (a) do their job as instructed and (b) keep their job so their kids keep eating and (c) perhaps stop the one-in-a-million idiot who thought to do real harm (understanding that the pros would never use the passenger apparatus for their nefarious deeds)?

Please understand: I don't walk around every day looking out in case a six-foot, seven-inch Arab with a portable dialysis machine should jump out to git me. I don't. I'm neither scared of terrorists, nor thunderstorms (both having similarly remote likelihoods of harming me). I do look both ways crossing the street, though, and I seldom run with scissors. That's just prudence.

I'll also be taking to the skies in the not-too-distant future. I'll do what I've always done of late: wear slip-on shoes, carry no change, empty my pockets of everything and go through security. I'll be civil to the working stiffs in the blue uniforms, even to the point of being pleasant. I'm like that. God help me for the recovering Southern Baptist that I am, but all that "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" stuff they drilled into my tiny, impressionable mind back in the basement of the baptist church actually "took," and darned if it doesn't work about 99% of the time.

Under those circumstances, I expect my experience to be no more miserable than any other airline experience, miserable air flight experiences being a function not of enhanced security, but of crappy airlines.

[wtmusic]

1. I flew yesterday, and that fancy backscatter machine sat idle

the entire time I was in the security line. No one was patted down, no one was irradiated.

IMO there's a reevaluation of policy in progress.

[GoneOffShore]

6. As well there should be.

The TSA and the Department of Homeland Security (sounds better in the original German: Heimatsicherheitsministerium) are out of control agencies, implementing fascistic policies to abrogate the Constitution.

Time to stop the nonsense and adopt real security measures that don't restrict travel and treating people who are traveling as criminals.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

34. Agreed

And LOVE your avatar! Cook free or die!

But what ARE those "real security measures that don't restrict travel and treating people who are traveling as criminals"? That's really the question.

[GoneOffShore]

97. Bruce Schneier has some thoughts on "real security"

mostly based on intelligence and profiling rather than reactions to past threats.

http://www.schneier.com/

[Taverner]

2. You know, if this happened when BUSH was prez....

There would have been absolutely 0 teabag resistance

"Hell, I trust 'Murica, what's wrong with you?"

[GrpCaptMandrake]

3. Precisely

Which is at least in part why I smell a rat in the present kerfuffle.

[Odin2005]

4. And the Apologists here would be screaming their heads off.

Concern over about policy is dead in this country, it's all about personal loyalty to "The Leader". If our side does it it's good, if the other side does it it's bad, it's politics as sports.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

8. Which I'm trying to avoid

I'm much more interested in seeing if we can actually imagine a course of action that WOULDN'T result in a cacaphony of outraged hooting

[Gravel Democrat]

20. What if the G-Men actually did their jobs in the first place?

“...On November 11, British intelligence officials sent the U.S. a cable indicating that a man named “Umar Farouk” had spoken to al-Awlaki, pledging to support jihad, but the cable did not reflect Abdulmutallab’s last name. Abdulmutallab’s father made a report to two CIA officers at the U.S. Embassy in Abuja, Nigeria, on November 19 regarding his son’s “extreme religious views”, and told the embassy that Abdulmutallab might be in Yemen. Acting on the report, the suspect’s name was added in November 2009 to the U.S..‘s 550,000-name Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment, a database of the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center. It was not added, however, to the FBI’s 400,000-name Terrorist Screening Database, the terror watch list that feeds both the 14,000-name Secondary Screening Selectee list and the U.S.‘s 4,000-name No Fly List, nor was his U.S. visa revoked.

“...U.S. State Department officials said in Congressional testimony that the State Department had wanted to revoke Abdulmutallab’s visa, but U.S. intelligence officials requested that his visa not be revoked. The intelligence officials’ stated reason was that revoking Abdulmutallab’s visa could have foiled a larger investigation into al-Qaida.

“...He had purchased his ticket with cash in Ghana on December 16. Prior to boarding the plane eyewitnesses Kurt Haskell and Lori Haskell testified live on CNN that they witnessed a “smartly dressed Indian man” helping Abdulmutallab onto the plane. They also testify that the ticket agent refused to allow Abdulmutallab on the plane because he did not have his own passport…”

**Would you be able to board an airplane bound for the US without a passport?***

Each and every one of these *facts* has been documented at the following link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umar_Farouk_Abdulmutallab

So by following established rules and adding a little common sense, there would have been no underwear bomber.

Where does the negligence lie here?

Will anyone from the Government be held accountable for the outrageous errors and oversights listed above?

The footnotes at the wiki entry apparently are unavailable to writers like Robinson, Marcus and the rest of the "left" who took part in a sliming campaign as noted by DU Member sabrina 1.

Because if they knew of such outrageous negligence, they surely would have pointed it out...Right?

[GrpCaptMandrake]

24. From what you posted

it doesn't sound like negligence. It sounds like an intentional decision.

Taking off shoes to foil another shoebomber is probably equally silly. As I noted, however, it's the one-in-a-million idiot they want to stop, not the "pros"

[Gravel Democrat]

30. So Granny gets groped because the G-men intentionally let a Muslim with

“extreme religious views” board a plane without a passport. Who was on a watch list. Whose father turned him in. Who bought his one way ticket with cash.

Got it.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

32. There's that word

"groped."

Are you implying that every TSA agent performing pat-downs is doing so for sexual gratification?

Too much emotion, too little reason. Exactly what I was getting at.

[TorchTheWitch]

79. you do realize that sexual assault doesn't have anything to do with sex?

I'm really pissed off in the extreme that when women FINALLY start getting people to realize that sexual assault and rape is about POWER not sexual intent that old hogwash is rearing it's ugly head again concerning this issue.

The intent of the person doing the unwarranted touching doesn't MATTER. The decision of whether or not one has been sexually assaulted lies with the person who was touched in intimate places of their body without warrant or consent and that consent must be without coercion.

Just how is it that the determination of whether or not a person was sexually assaulted lies with the person that is doing the unwarranted touching without consent and not with the person who was violated by that unwarranted and unconsented touching??? Just how does that work?

You're a woman sitting on a park bench reading a newspaper and suddenly some strange man comes up to you and without warrant and without your consent grabs your breasts. You call the police over and they have to determine whether or not you were sexually assaulted by this person. Well, if this ASININE theory that that decision lies with the person who did the unwarranted and unconsented touching the police will then have to rely on the testimony of the stranger breast grabber whether or not his intent was sexual in nature...

Police: "Well, sir, this young lady says that you just came up to her and without warrant or her consent grabbed her breasts. When you grabbed her breasts, was your intent sexual in nature?"

Groper: "Certainly not! Though I've never seen this woman before in my life I walked up to her as she was sitting on the bench reading the paper and put my hands on her breasts because I thought they might be cold and tried to warm them for her!"

Police: "Sorry, Miss, this man says that his intent was not sexual in nature and he was merely attempting to warm your breasts, therefore you have not been sexually assaulted. Have a nice day."

GET. REAL.

[sabrina 1]

92. It doesn't matter what the agents are experiencing. I don't much

care what any stranger who touches me inappropriately is feeling. What matters in all cases of inappropriate touching of another human being is how the victim feels about it. I am not interested in the psychology of the gropers. And government approved groping of strangers is no different than non-government approved groping, not to the victims.

Defending these practices is outrageous especially by democrats. I never thought democrats would flip flop like this on a issue they fought so hard against for six years.

[Blue_In_AK]

98. Kurt Haskell just spent over an hour on the phone

with Shannyn Moore's radio show. His account of what happened with that "Christmas bomber" and their flight is astounding, and I'm still trying to pick my jaw up off the floor. I'm really starting to believe that all these so-called terrorists have been plants used to usher in the use of these very pricey scanners.

[Xicano]

51. Not too difficult

All you need are these:

[sabrina 1]

78. They were, because it did happen when Bush was president

and those who are apologists now, like the Nation magazine eg, WERE screaming their heads off, and they were effective. The 'enhanced pat-downs' (yes, they tried this before in 2004) had to be abolished there was so much outrage back then.

I have not changed my opinion on the issue, but now I'm a teabagger or a Koch funded astro-turfer.

Funny how alike both sides are with just a few on each side sticking to their principles.

Ironically we've lost the hypocrites on our side in this battle, but we've gained the hypocrites on the other side, so it's a wash as far as the numbers are concerned I suppose.

The fight to end these abuses goes on anyhow. When something's right it's worth fighting for.

It's just funny to watch one group of hypocrites jumping ship while the other group climbs on board.

But I'll take whatever support we can get to stop these totalitarian practices before it's too late. And the hypocrites on the right DO know how to get a lot of media attention which should help. We on the left don't seem to be as good as they are at doing that.

[Odin2005]

84. I fear for our country when politics becomes all about personal loyalty.

[ProfessorGAC]

95. Seems Highly Speculative

There were lots of things we didn't like, said so, and just had to do them anyway, with regard to airport travel.

I think a lot of the so-called "apologists" are acting exactly as they would have 5 years ago. Don't like it and thinks it overkill but; do it despite our displeasure.
GAC

[treestar]

90. "There are people out there who want to KILL you!"

"There are evil people in this world."

"Your freedom is useless if you are dead."

Exactly.

[Boudica the Lyoness]

96. Calm down

don't be so frightened. There's no need to offer up your snizz to save your arse.

[kowalski1]

91. there have been 0 teabag resistance

the only people protesting this on the right has been the libertarians and the Paultards. Freedomworks, Tea Party Nation, Palin, Beck, etc have all be silent on this issue. But I would really welcome their support in form of a large protest in cold frigid Washington DC.

[jpgray]

5. Shorter Mandrake: "I guess it's necessary and appropriate"

Which is all we can really do. We can only guess if underwear inspection is necessary and appropriate for ensuring safety. There is no politically workable argument for lessening security, or even declaring some combination of procedures sufficient--the instant an attack happens, those who called for less, or called what we have enough, will be vulnerable. No one wants to be vulnerable. So we will band-aid over the latest attempts as they come in, and tell ourselves "I guess it's necessary and appropriate."

There will be no sober discussion on how many attacks over a given period of time is acceptable, even though such a number is built into any set of procedures. No amount of attacks is acceptable, so the standard of security will always be a floating one. After each attempt, it will be time for another added ritual. No addition will carry with it the claim that it will defeat all attempts, just that it will defeat the last variety. And if there are endless varieties?

We are engaged in adding a variety of locks to the barn door--each would bar passage for the latest escaped animal. To lock the door utterly for all animals would upset too many, and to keep the animals from wanting to escape lies not in our power. Not if we want to maintain our influence, anyway.

God that was a terrible metaphor.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

12. I'm really not guessing

about the issues relating to the hooting over batteries and Fourth Amendment violations.

I also don't think I evidenced an opinion as to either necessity or propriety. My question is how to deal with the situation otherwise. From the president's standpoint, it truly seems unwinnable.

[jpgray]

16. It's perfectly winnable. We're under attack, we need to do x to keep us safe

This has been a winning formula in politics for I don't know how long. It's been documented since Cleon at least, so what, 2400+ years? The basic question of any of these procedures is whether they are necessary and appropriate. We have no idea, but are less afraid to add than to do nothing, let alone take away, so that's what we're going to do.

If the entire point of your post is that visceral reactions and legal realities differ, you might have made it more briefly. :) Enjoyed your post, though.

[Eric J in MN]

55. Who or what is "Cleon"? NT

NT

[jpgray]

56. A demagogue at Athens during the Peloponnesian War

Played upon fear to argue for massacres, that sort of thing.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

59. Here's Cleon

Taking Wikipedia WAGOS, of course: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleon

[Eric J in MN]

7. "when it's our daughter flying home from college"

...do we want her to be irradiated, & then told that "we've selected you for an enhanced patdown" and then groped for four minutes, using gloves which may have touched other passengers butts & vaginas?

[GrpCaptMandrake]

19. Depends

on the level of irradiation. If she's coming home from the U. of Hawaii or Miami, odds are she's gotten a lot more "irradiation" than she did at airport security.

Please tell me: why do you feel it necessary to describe the procedure as "groped?" At least one definition of that word implies an intent for sexual gratification. Are you asserting that the TSA agents are doing this for purposes of sexual gratification? That seems a rather profound level of specific intent to apply to a group as large as one containing all TSA agents.

[Eric J in MN]

54. TSA guards are doing it as a job requirement & not for sexual gratification.

...I consider a stranger touching someone's genitals without consent to be groping, regardless.

[Mojorabbit]

9. It has nothing to do with being prudish.

It is a violation of personal space to be touched without consent. I came of age in the early 70's sex, drugs, and rock and roll scene before HIV and I can say one thing I am not is prudish. I lost my modesty decades ago but even I do not want to be probed in my underwear by a stranger so I can board a plane.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

11. "Probed?"

Do you know something about the procedure I don't?

[Mojorabbit]

71. I see that you

are all but stating downthread that people are prudes or have other issues if they object to a stranger putting their hands in their underwear but I think you won't find too many people who will agree with that line of attack. I find it really creepy that you think that it is not a violation of "person" but that is just me.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

75. Why do you define a simple query

as a "line of ATTACK" (emphasis added)?

I'm not offering questions of what is a "violation of person" as much as I am asking why it is that we can't have a sane discussion about what might possibly might ameliorate the situation.

Your various subjective characterizations don't add or subtract from the objective realities about "hands in their underwear" (even absent proof that anyone had their hands "in their underwear."

This "controversy" aches for a little bit of reason.

[RandomThoughts]

14. They know that.

They know it is obtrusive, they literally have reached the point of just doing it anyways, not caring if people object.

It is something else, it is not about security, it is about a total lack of respect for rights, and wanting people to know that. Weather it is sabotage of government, or some control system is a guess, but it is not for security, it is a conditioning or control thing.

It is beyond absurd.


It destroys the credibility of the entire government and media that it is allowed without outrage from government, and even the TSA themselves. Literally wipes out any concept of a chance of government moving in a better direction.


It is beyond conceptual ability to even understand how people could accept that for a society, however I been out of the conditioning loop for decades, so that might be part of it.

[Union Scribe]

80. How right you are.

It's remarkably offensive for the supporters of the TSA's policies to liken unwelcome physical contact with being prudish or puritanical. I guess in the same vein molestation victims wouldn't see it as such a big deal if they didn't think their genitals were "privates" and "sinful" pffft.

[RandomThoughts]

10. heh, I understand part of that thought.

If someone abuses you then don't return anger to them, but you can explain to them why it is wrong. And not perpetuate that system.

My first comment was cerebral about security state, and out of perspective media, but there is a visceral part also.


The point is "do onto others" also means standing up for those that do not have the knowledge or ability to object to what you also know is wrong. Many of those people excepting a security state do not know the concepts of courage required to be free, and without those concepts they can be treated even worse at some other point. It almost seems that they want to create a hostage feeling in citizens, where they have to submit to things.

Honestly I would not complain about being searched, nor much of anything else, LOL, but would not agree to it to fly on a plane, nor let someone say that is a valid requirement. But I will complain about anyone else being searched in those methods. And I will argue against it, and not be part of it, because nobody should have to submit to such things in what should be a free society.


It is more then security, more then even unjust search, it reaches psychological warfare tactics of use of humiliation and submission to condition people.

When they start kicking in doors to search for copies of the constitution, will you just go along with it?

You could make your same argument of do unto others to justify accepting any wrong done by anyone, you don't have to hate them, nor be upset at them, but you don't have to accept it either.

Or you can, it is your choice.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

15. I don't see the humiliation angle

Or the submission angle. Maybe I'm weird insofar as I don't find it humilating. Isn't humilation predicated upon shame? Why should one be ashamed of one's natural state? I've seen accounts of women "humilated" over a breast prosthesis. Why was she humilated? Does she carry a burden of absent-breast shame?

A man getting his crotch patted down by another man: where's the humiliation? Is he ashamed of his "junk," (a phrase, which, though a part of common parlance I think offers yet further insight into our body images), or ashamed he might . . . what? There's more here than meets the eye.

[LisaL]

18. What exactly would you personally find humiliating?

Anything?

[GrpCaptMandrake]

21. Not much

if I didn't perceive an intent to humiliate coming at me. My willingness to be humiliated is in direct proportion to the degree of human dignity I feel and my refusal to be ashamed of things I cannot control.

[LisaL]

22. Figures.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

26. I'm sorry

Am I supposed to feel a heightened degree of willingness to be humiliated?

What "figures?"

[LisaL]

36. You aren't humiliated by much, and you are just fine

with all TSA procedures. We got it. What you don't seem to get is not everybody feels the same way you do.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

41. And there's the magic word!

"Feels."

It seems to be all we're doing with this issue. Not a lot of thinking. Even less knowing.

But you are wrong in one regard: I'm not "just fine with all TSA procedures." I didn't say I am.

I pointed out, however, the lack of reasonable discourse on the issue, and the surfeit of irrational, rank emotionalism.

I'm still waiting for someone to suggest what should be in place instead of the current protocols.

[LisaL]

43. You have a problem with "feels?"

Well someone either feels humiliated or not.
You don't. Quite a few others do. You seem to be unable to figure that out.

"'I was so humiliated'
Marlene McCarthy of Rhode Island said she went through the body scanner and was told by a TSA agent to step aside. In "full view of everyone," McCarthy said in an e-mail, the agent "immediately put the back of her hand on my right side chest and I explained I wore a prosthesis."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40278427/ns/travel-news/

[GrpCaptMandrake]

48. It's not a "problem"

It's a recognition that all this cataloging of outrages doesn't take us toward any sort of a solution. It merely whips up the emotional frenzy even higher.

Clearly, accounts like this mitigate toward seeking a meaningful way to reduce such apparently traumatic incidents.

[Mimosa]

23. Wimp, sheep, whatever.

Submit. Be happy.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

27. OK, what then

Constitutes "submitting?" Clearly, you're trying to be insulting, but it isn't quite hitting its mark.

Are you trying to announce some level of some sort of as-yet-unspecified superiority?

[jpgray]

37. You are indeed a pillar of strength in these times

If only all of us could see the humiliation suffered by others as irrational weakness and pathological shame. I don't mind jokes about how white people can't dance, for example. Would that everyone lived by my standards and possessed my strength of identity and lack of racial shame.

Seriously, no empathy for rape victims? Abused children? Really? You have to admit this is going to be traumatic for them, whatever your views on the policy.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

44. Did I say that?

No. I didn't.

In point of fact, however, since you raised it, humiliation is different from post-traumatic stress, which is what you're talking about with the victims for whom you inferred my lack of sympathy.

My purpose was to ask, among other things, what might be better done, and there you go and identify one. +1 for you! Clearly, we need a procedure for such people, so as to minimize the risk of aggravating a pre-existing trauma. How hard could that possibly be? Good thinking!

[jpgray]

50. Of course! We just need a database of abused women and children. Like the no fly list!

I have another proposal that you will no doubt enjoy. Let's make a database of all the emotionless automata among us. These shall enter security naked, as they are insensible to humiliation. They will not suffer at all, and will greatly expedite proceedings for the rest. In fact, their nakedness will be seen as a badge of superiority over the Puritanical feeling mob. Agreed?

[GrpCaptMandrake]

57. I must be typing in Martian . . .

because the English I typed on this end didn't say "create a database just like the no-fly list," and yet lo! and behold! that's apparently what came out on your end. Odd.

Rather than your ad absurdam suggestions, why don't we just go through the line? For those who have some pre-existing trauma, let's have a different set of protocols.

Above all, however, I can't get away from the idea that things will be dramatically better if we stop allowing ourselves to be driven through a news cycle while running around like chickens with our heads cut off.

[GliderGuider]

87. How hard could it be?

Try to create an inspection that is completely invasive yet utterly non-threatening. I don't think it can be done. Some people have major psychological issues around privacy, and any procedure that crosses that boundary and completely invades their privacy is going to be unimaginably distressing. Just because you can't imagine it doesn't make those people disappear.

I really can't come up with an alternative that allows the TSA to distinguish between a tampon and a stick of plastique with 100% reliability without being completely invasive. Can you?

[RandomThoughts]

45. It is a natural tendency to have areas of personal space.

And concepts of private areas, the very act of forced patting in those areas creates a submission requirement against normal societal interactions. If people have a concept of areas strangers don't pat commonly, then they have to invoke a thought of allowing it, which requires a brief moment of suppression of a thought of social norm. Hence it invokes a submissive action.


Nice twist on it, however I am thinking about the concept of persons space, while you try to turn it into blaming the victim. It is funny that you phrase it that way, by your definition you would not mind a women being raped unless she is insecure. See the point yet.


It is not about if a person minds being touched, it is that a person should not have to make that decision to fly on a plane, or any other situation.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

60. "Or any other situation"

ANY?

One of the things I find interesting about the TSA Outrage is that many of the people being outraged (not at DU, of course) have been as silent as Grant's Tomb about such things all while they happened day in and day out in Iraq and Afghanistan. Apparently, a lot of folks in this country (Baggers, BoogerEaters, GOP, etc.) are only concerned with such things once it's their oxe getting gored. I guess that's just human nature, but the irony of those civil liberties chickens coming home to roost isn't lost on me.

[RandomThoughts]

64. I do agree with that post.

You make an interesting point, maybe internationalist run the TSA and they are trying to teach the American people a lesson.

But just another guess.

[IDemo]

13. An earlier comment of mine on this

If you think that the Scan n' Grab is fully justified because of security concerns, then feel free. But don't try to tell me I have been manipulated by a Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy if I disagree. That's just plain bs.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

17. And don't suggest I've suggested you have been

But I certainly would love to see some reasoned discussion of the issue that doesn't involve emotionally-charged (and therefore largely intellect-free) phrases like "grope" or "Scan n' Grab."

As I understand it, the system as it stands was designed to reduce and not increase the number of people subjected to a pat-down.

[IDemo]

28. You pretty plainly did exactly that:

-- "the right-wing drives messaging in this country to the point that the White House couldn't message "FIRE!" in a crowded firehouse. Witness the fact that the corporate ForProfit Media is on this like a duck on a junebug. Witness the fact that it only got "legs" right after the mid-term elections. Witness that it's happening at a time when it's managed to completely overshadow the right-wing assault on the START Treaty."

If you are comfortable with the gropes, congratulations. When you imply that a woman with a breast prosthesis who is not comfortable with the treatment has mental or emotional hangups she should just get over, you have told me all I need to know about your character.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

38. No, you've imagined all you want to imagine

My mother was a breast cancer survivor (right, radical, lymphectomy) back when a lot of women didn't survive. You wanna know about my character? I'll tell you about it: it comes from watching her be frank about her disease, frank about her surgery, frank about her radiation therapy, frank about her rehab and frank about her life going forward. She wasn't ashamed. Didn't mind talking about it to other, more "discrete" southern women when she knew it might help ONE survive as she had.

Actually, knowing you think a woman with a prosthesis should feel humiliation tells me MORE than I want to know about your character.

And using the word "gropes" tells me where your head is in this discussion: entirely absent. Nothing but visceral response.

[LisaL]

40. You know what? Nobody told that woman how she should feel.

She felt the way she did. As it is her right. You are the one who seem to be arguing she had no right to feel the way she did.
"Bossi said she removed the prosthetic from her bra. She did not take the name of the agent, she said, "because it was just so horrific of an experience, I couldn't believe someone had done that to me. I'm a flight attendant. I was just trying to get to work.""
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40278427/ns/travel-news/

[GrpCaptMandrake]

47. And there it is again

More feelings.

I don't know why she was "horrified." Neither will I speculate.

It does seem to suggest, however, that there should be some rational modification of process whereby such people need not have previous trauma back-referenced. That's the point: we seem to be more interested in cataloging "outrages" than in trying to find a successful strategy to deal with the problem.

I'm sorry for offending you, if indeed I have. Please know that you haven't offended me. I value meaningful dialogue and discussion.

[IDemo]

46. Verbal mobius strip on that one

"you think a woman with a prosthesis should feel humiliation"

You're one to accuse others of putting words into your mouth. That was of course not what I said or implied.

Again, if you are entirely comfortable with the situation at hand, good. Don't presume to give the people who
aren't a dressing down (oops, sorry for that) over their supposed hangups.

[TheKentuckian]

25. You wrote all that to say cut Obama slack and allow continued erosion of our rights

because it is too hard politically to do otherwise?

I howled at his predecessors for this unAmerican bullshit and he gets no special dispensation because he is supposedly on our side.

The prude shit is inane. We have every right to expose ourselves or not, we have right for our genitals to be touched how we like, not at all, or as best as the person we invite to do so can manage.

It is about self determination not being a puritan and that lazy cop out is because the TeaPubliKlans are finally complaining too and it gives the meme a little cover and allows certain "centrist" to lump all opposition to their bullshit policies together and attempt to herd leftists into going along what they have opposed for years and years.

[Individualist]

29. +1

The "centrists" refuse to accept the fact that we're not buying what they're trying to sell.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

39. That word . . .

I don't think it means what you think it means . . .

. . . at least if you think I'm a "centrist."

[GrpCaptMandrake]

31. Are you calling me a "centrist?"

Best be careful there, Jasper, as them's fightin' words where I come from. And I don't think one can EVER go wrong noting this country's deeply repressed puritanical streak.

Please don't infer my intent. I didn't write anything to ask anyone to give Obama "slack." I defy you to find it in the piece. Me, I'm simply asking (again) what you would have him do. We know people don't like this. I didn't say I like this. But I really would like to know what folks would have him do, when we know this White House doesn't know how to be proactive on an issue and is only capable of responding to the other side.

I don't know what to do about this. Do you?

[TheKentuckian]

42. Do what is right, live our values, and tell the people the truth which is we have

layers of clandestine, military, and law enforcement digging for the threats, we filter a lot out, but being the land of the free demands we be the home of the brave.

That we will not give up our liberties in response to terrorist. That we will live and die as a free people. That we will not negotiate with terrorist and if they capture one of our planes WE will destroy it rather than let them have their way.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

58. Heroic stuff!

And I have this mental image of a HUUUUUGE picture of Leonidas from "300" at every airport: "This.Is . . . Hackensack!"

Me, I'm inspired. You write that stuff nicely.

I recognize that there's a camel's-nose-under-the-tent aspect to these things. That's why I burned so brightly over torture and habeas corpus and renditions and domestic spying and all the other outrages.

As noted, however, I really am having a hard time finding those issues in this outrage. No constitutional rights are involved of which an American court would likely take cognizance. It seems we are primarily concerned in the TSA Outrage with matters of subjective annoyance. Those, I would hope, we can work out by making a better process.

[highprincipleswork]

68. More heroic stuff

Yes, I would like more heroic stuff from President Obama and less "reasonableness" - that isn't reason at all!!!!

He's becoming more and more like the Fred Armisen on "Saturday Night Live", in that he and his policies routinely come off as weak, ineffectual, half-assed, overly reasoned, and overly timid.

I would love his stuff to be a lot more heroic.

And I'd love it if we could get the American people out of their post 9-11 fears to a point where they are truly reasonable again - and yes, this requires them to be instinctually attached to all their visceral senses and emotions at the same time. That's what makes a great leader, a great fighter, a great lover, a great patriot. Too much "reason" a la "virtual reality" is bad for your health.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

70. We sure got lots of that soaring, heroic rhetoric

on the campaign trail. Just not so much in actual application.

I'd love for Obama to find his inner Harry Truman. Problem is, if he goes looking for it, I'm terrified he'll F-up and find MORE of his Inner Dukakis.

I'd argue that what we're getting from Obama isn't "reasonableness." If anything, it's a pasty imitation of it, for it isn't "reasonable" to think you can work with a gang of thugs who routinely tell you they hate your guts. It seems Obama doesn't think they really mean it. They do, and I fear he'll figure that out far too late.

Those post-9/11 fears you mention aren't really anything new. Americans have always been scared of some bogey-man. We merely see the post-9/11 fears better because of their proximity.

[TheKentuckian]

72. American courts have a long tradition of aiding and abetting the police state.

The Terry stops are literally a parody of the Fourth Amendment. There is no way you can read what is written and twist it into the leeway that is now granted the police.

As for the Sparta jokes, you asked and were answered. You do much of anything else and the terrorist truly win and rights and liberties are possibly lost forever. You don't actually think there will be a day that terror is defeated and this crap can be dismantled, do you?

Your acceptance of groping and machine assisted strip searches does not change the fact they are violations of your rights nor does a Justice system devoted to a police state's approval anymore than when courts approved of slavery, women as property of their husbands, or any of the other distortions that US courts have bothered to be cognizant of at different times.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

76. OK

I didn't say I agree with the present interpretation of the 4th Amendment. I am, however, enough of a realist to realize that stare decisis does, in fact, apply to the 4th Amendment.

Do me a favor: please define the rights you claim are being violated.

Please define "groping" and then we can have a dialogue. I won't accept your definitions as the basis upon which an objective discussion may be had. I'm pretty sure I haven't accepted "groping and machine assisted strip searches." Do you understand how silly it sounds to insist upon rights you won't even define?

There is simply NO comparison to slavery or disenfranchisement of women and dealing with an implied consent pat down.

In answer to your question: NO. No authoritarian state will ever willingly back off its authority. Do YOU think it will?

We preserve ideas of freedom by continuing the dialogue about it.

In the interim, we try to minimize the harm. Is that a bad thing? Which would you rather have: a full-blown fascist state where everyone gets a cavity search or an attempt to make an unpleasant process made as UN-unpleasant as possible?

[TheKentuckian]

77. I don't refuse at all. I've defined them both in other threads but not here, to be fair

The right to be free from unreasonable search is being violated. The right to be secure in one's person and property is being violated. The right to basic privacy is being violated.

The right to decide who has intimate contact wit you is be violated.

I do not view the "scan" as any different than a strip search and that such equipment what be forbidden expressly if it existed at the time of the writing of the Bill of Rights without a warrant pr an arrest.

Groping or being handled in a physically in a way that I do not agree to or consent to. I do not imply that my penis needs to be handled to travel. I do not want anybody I don't know touching my scrotum unless I'm getting laid or seeking a prognosis.
This is a reasonable set of expectations.

I don't even begin to relate to this mentality that is like "what's with this new crazy not wanting to be strip searched and have your genitals inspected to pay to be spam in a can?!?".

As for your false choice, I accept neither. I certainly won't AGREE to either for any sake, including seeking harm reduction.

None of this eliminates the "need" for cavity searches but that would be too much in one gulp.

I'm not having a discussion on the weight of rights but maintaining them. I don't pick and choose and wish to err toward too much freedom than too little.

I have been consistent all my life in these matters and am not going to "(d)evolve" my thinking because a Democrat is in office overseeing ramping up what I oppose instead of fighting against it.

Freedom is best preserved by demanding it and living it. Talking is fantastic but it isn't freedom and we can chatter many long nights as Liberty slips away.

[woo me with science]

82. Magnificent post. nt

[Desertrose]

93. Excellent. Well said!

Thank you.

[Union Scribe]

81. Excellent post.

[Possumpoint]

33. I Don't Fly

I will not submit to searches without probable cause. If they start the same procedures with trains etc. I will only use my car. That's about all I use now though anyway.

If you want to give up your rights for a sense of security who am I to criticize? I won't!

[GrpCaptMandrake]

49. That's one way to do it

But do be aware that you have a significantly diminished expectation of privacy in your automobile. It's no real protection in 4th Amendment terms. Besides, there aren't really any 4th Amendment issues at stake in the TSA security line. It's a matter of implied consent.

[RandomThoughts]

35. Best guess.

The Administration was given a no win situation, where they would have to allow TSA to do the searches that would smear government, or the group telling them to do that would blow up some planes then say the government refused to do their search measures. Then media would run them into the ground on it.

Either that or the Administration is in on it. Which does not add up.



Although that is just best guess.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

52. And we'll get a better sense

of the lay of the land when we see if the Admin actually starts doing things to mitigate the "outrage." If they do, I'd say they're making a decent (not "good") faith effort to make a bad situation somewhat less bad.

[PeaceNikki]

53. I agree with you 100%.

It's completely a no-win situation and can't be discussed rationally. It's full of hyperbolic wrought-with-emotion-think-of-the-children-and-teddy-bears-and-puppies bullshit.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

61. BINGO!

And by definition, the problem will not only not be solved, but be made worse, by all the mindless emotionalism-for-emotionalism's sake.

[LisaL]

62. If only all of us were like robots, with no emotions.

What a perfect world would it be.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

65. You may think that

I don't.

What I do know, however, is that no significant problem has ever been solved to satisfaction without a degree of dispassionate discussion. Screaming and carrying on is fun, but it doesn't tend to make anything better in the long run.

[uppityperson]

74. +1000

[highprincipleswork]

63. Fck Reason

I say that "reason" is not all that it's cracked up to be.

Is it reasonable to allow these things to happen, when they have such a small percentage chance of accomplishing anything, while we slowly give away our quality of life, our reasonable expectation of privacy, our enjoyment of life?
Is it reasonable to allow each and every method that has even an infinitesimal chance of producing a result, including cavity searches on everyone, which certainly must then be allowed, for even the most paltry of reasonable imaginations can imagine hiding things "there".

The human animal's ability to have senses and feeling is all to forgotten in this modern day world, including the intrinsic value that these senses and feelings have, particularly when lined up with an intellect. And those who consider themselves Democrats or Progressives too often go off into areas of sheer "reasonableness" that is probably not reasonable at all.

Was 9-11 reasonable?
Did it even make sense that something like this could happen, driven by relatively unskilled personnel, who accomplished so much with so little training?
Never seemed reasonable or even plausible to me. And I certainly do not find it reasonable to give up all my life qualities in a kind of fear of it being repeated, partly because it never should have happened in the first place and never will again, unless someone damn well wants it to and allows it somehow to happen.

Taking off even my shoes in the airport - is that reasonably going to stop it from happening? I seriously doubt it.

We need to pay attention to our senses and our feelings, in order to live good, productive lives and even to survive, and certainly to be patriots. And we need to use these sense to stand up against what is wrong and to fight for what we feel is right, no matter those who would try to argue us down with a kind of reasonableness that rings hollow.

As long as we're talking about being reasonable, America will never become reasonable or even productive again till it gets beyond this irrational fear. For, until then, the terrorists have truly won, and we have already become "terrorized".

[GrpCaptMandrake]

69. Agreed in part, disagreed in part

I don't fly more than four or five times a year. Still, I don't see a lot of quality of life in an airport. Most of that has to do not with the Terror State, but with the Profit state of the airlines. Let's face it: flying in the U.S. sucks. A lot. As a 6'2" male, most jets make me feel like I'm traveling in something repo'd from Air Hobbiton. The flights are crammed like sardine cans to the point of misery. Upgrades are a thing of the past. So too is even the stuff we once derided as "awful" airline food.

I more than understood that the hijackings of September 11, 2001 happened. The administration in place at the time ignored warning after warning.

As I said, the stuff at passenger security is to sieve out the idiots, not the professionals who are good at this stuff. Ever seen a picture of the ShoeBomber? That guy couldn't beat Shemp in an IQ contest. The same with the underwear bomber. Morons. They were both caught accidentally, after other warnings were ignored, as another writer noted upthread. So we wind up getting our shoes x-rayed. Now, because Obama's in an unwinnable situation, we're getting the confounded Rapiscans replicating all over our airports. It is most assuredly annoying.

But none of either my misgivings or yours addresses the basic question: how do we make it better? How do we correct the obvious flaws in the protocols?

Your observation about America and its irrational fears are demonstrably true. They are true, however, throughout our history. We were scared of the Indians, scared of the English, scared of the French, scared of the Spanish, scared of the Commies, scared of the Atheists, scared of the Negroes, scared of the Gayz, scared, scared, scared.. I don't see that changing any time soon, especially now that we have The Muslims to be scared of, as well as, of course, US: The Lib'rulllz! Remember: we've been bug-a-boos longer than The Muslims have.

[Name removed]

66. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Stinky The Clown]

67. Living involves risk. We need to stop being wussies.

We expend far less effort staving off drunk drivers or cancer from smoking.

Proportionality is a good word. This airplane-a-phobia is just plain stupid.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

73. You're right!

We spend far less effort staving off drunk drivers (and arguably tap dancing on the Constitution) than we do for airport security. Smoking just doesn't count in the equation because smokers don't count in many instances.

But when something awful happens in a car, maybe a dozen people die (chain reaction pile-up). When something awful happens on a plane, the numbers are in triple digits. Proportionality is at the heart of paranoia.

[woo me with science]

83. I recommended this thread even though I disagree with you strongly,

because there is excellent discussion herein.

[LWolf]

85. "What would we have him do?"

Support and defend our health, privacy, and dignity.

Bomb-sniffing dogs.

[GliderGuider]

86. My response to "scope and grope" is not to fly. I have that luxury, others don't.

Many people hold jobs that require them to fly. These requirements were laid down in a kindler, gentler era when airport security kept their hands off the bodies of average travelers. Now the rules have changed, and for those who have no options except flying or unemployment there is nothing they can do but submit.

This is simply another manifestation of tyranny, no matter who is President of the USA.

[benEzra]

88. The number of people killed via terrah-ist bombs on U.S. aircraft 2001-2010 was ZERO.

None. Nada.

That's my question: what would we have him do? It's all well and good for us to watch clips of George Carlin saying "I think flying should be MORE dangerous, goddammit," but do we really think that when it's our daughter flying home from college, or a husband leaving on a cross-country business trip? Do we? Are we that politically jaded?

Do I feel the same way if it's me, or my family, flying? Hell fricking YES.

The abuse of passengers' dignity and the revocation of civil liberties that we are seeing this year is about control, security theater, and financial gain for scanner manufacturers, not safety. Air travel was exceedingly safe without the recent gate gropes and imagers, and is not made significantly more safe by it.

[Desertrose]

94. +1000

[treestar]

89. Common sense!

:yourock: