Boycott Body Scanners

Wednesday, November 24.

John Tyner turned down an invitation to step into one of the new body scanners springing up in US airports which offer security guards an all but naked view of passengers. When he refused, the guard at San Diego said he would have to submit to a body pat-down and then went on to describe what that meant.

Tyner said he was fine with that up to the point where a hand would explore his groin.

"If you touch my junk, I'm gonna have you arrested," he said.

Needless to say, Tyner didn't fly. Instead he was threatened with a civil suit and a fine of $10,000 (£6,200). A week later, the incident has reverberated across the country to the halls of Congress and prompted a campaign for travellers to boycott body scanners next Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving and one of the busiest for American airports.

[...]

[TSA Chief John] Pistole was also forced to defend the introduction, at the beginning of this month, of more probing body searches for those who do not wish to go through the scanners. The searches include a firm pressing of a security guard's hand on genitalia and breasts.

  Guardian

This is just outrageous.

"I'm not going to change those policies," he said. The TSA chief said that most air passengers, given a choice between a plane full of people who have been screened and one where they have not, would choose the former: "I think everybody will want to opt for the screening with the assurance that that flight is safe and secure."

Think again, you idiot ass. Think again. And to all you folks who say you don't mind taking off your shoes to go through security checks because it makes you feel safer - you probably deserve to have your junk touched. Where did you think this would lead? And what happens when the next terrorist smuggles something on board a plane via body cavity? X-rays and pat-downs don't reveal that. Will it then be okay to have a random cavity search of passengers?

Outrageous.

On Thursday, Congressman Ron Paul introduced legislation to counter what he called the "calamity" of airport security. It proposes barring the government from doing what ordinary citizens would not be allowed to do to strangers – photographing them naked or touching their private parts.

Thank you, Congressman Paul. I will not be flying anywhere that requires an x-ray or a pat-down. It's just outrageous that we let our government do this to us. Jennifer Abel says it clearly and well.

However...

For all the noise, a CBS poll this week found that four out of five Americans see body scanners as a necessary security measure.

The terrorists have won.