FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Double Opt-Out at Dulles this morning, barred from my flight
Old Nov 17, 2011, 3:32 pm
  #14  
WillCAD
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Baltimore, MD USA
Programs: Southwest Rapid Rewards. Tha... that's about it.
Posts: 4,329
Trying to transit any major airport and having even the least expectation of being able to double opt-out and still fly is setting yourself up for disappointment.

These things are going to be everywhere within the next 24-36 months (I think the original timeline was to have one at every checkpoint in the US by the end of 2014?) We are more than a 18 months into the process of raping the taxpayers' wallets to fund the rapes of their bodies and Constitutional rights, and the AIT scanners are so prevalent now that it is almost impossible to fly without having to encounter one.

If you encounter one, and don't wish to go through it, you will have to opt-out, and if you opt-out, you will either get a pat-down or you won't fly. It's just that simple.

At those checkpoints which don't have an AIT, or which have the AIT shut down or are only using it on a small percentage of the travelers who transit there, the possibility of being selected at random for more intense screening is always there, and more intense screening means either AIT or pat-down.

The TSA is like a Terminator - it can't be reasoned with, it can't be bargained with, it doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear - and it absolutely will not stop, EVER, until the Bill of Rights is dead.

No other choices exist - submit, or don't fly.

OP, I commend you on your willingness to allow them to deny you flight; in that situation, many people would have caved and taken either the AIT or the rubdown. But sooner or later, you're going to have to admit to yourself that even attempting to get through an airport today unmolested is like hitting on twenty - the odds are VERY long against you. Just trying it puts you in the position you were in today, where your prior traumatic experience reduces you to tears and ruins your day.

Perhaps someday the country will come to its senses and stop abusing the citizenry in this egregious manner, but until then, we have to get through life the best we can, and that means that you have to be prepared when you go to the airport and are confronted with two unacceptable choices, and not allow it to re-traumatize you.
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