How did our country get to this point?

[xiphias]

Just got through security at Tampa airport.  Opted for a patdown instead of the backscatter.  Am still shaking from anger.  Didn't show any upset to the agents; not their fault, and didn't want to be arrested for causing a problem.  But how the HELL did out country get to the point that we are willing to be treated as probable-cause criminals for traveling?  It's unAmerican.  It's against everything a free country is supposed to be.  And I have no choice!  If I'm to visit Lis's family, I have to accept this infringement of my right to not undergo a search.

 

I have to accept that free movement around my country is now probable cause for criminal activity.  How the hell is this acceptable?

Posted via LiveJournal app for Android.

Comments

[theletterelle.livejournal.com]

I've gotten the patdown as well. I was shocked at what they did in my pubic area. If I were a man, it would have felt a lot worse.

I have to wonder if this, combined with the increasing cost of air travel, will keep more people from traveling via air.

[ragman-jack.livejournal.com]

If you believe the conspiracy theorists, that's exactly what the upper class wants. They want us to be good little plebes and stay where we are unless called. I can't honestly say that this theory is baseless paranoia.

Personally, though, I think its fear. We haven't really been attacked on our own soil since Pearl Harbor and then 9/11 happened. No one knows how to handle it and the policticans had to be seen doing something or risk being voted out of office.

In other words, we're acting like children.

[ailbhe]

We teach children not to do this to others.

[ragman-jack.livejournal.com]

And yet we do it to ourselves. Oh, the irony.

[ailbhe]

In general, people teach children to be much nicer than most adults end up being, I think.

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

We do know how to handle it, but that doesn't satisfy the fear of the chicken littles, so we put on some security theater and they feel better. If it wasn't insulting and intrusive, it wouldn't make people "feel" safe.

[embryomystic.livejournal.com]

We haven't really been attacked on our own soil since Pearl Harbor and then 9/11 happened.

Didn't Washington State get bombed a bit during World War II, after Pearl Harbor?

[(Anonymous)]

I hesitate to speculate that something necessarily feels worse for a man than it does for a woman. I would just say it's bad for a person with a lot of body modesty--not as bad for an exhibitionist. (Of course, 'not as bad' is different from 'acceptable.') I'd also expect it to be very bad for survivors of child molestation. The TSA's idea of propriety only goes so far as to have male agents groping male travelers, and female agents groping female travelers...but that doesn't necessarily make it less triggery for the person being groped. Perhaps even the opposite, as for the guys I know who flinch when they have to be examined by a male doctor.