Originally Posted by
studentff
Who is innocent?
The TSOs/BDOs? I said nothing about punishing the TSOs/BDOs. I may not like what they did, but like I said, they have as much right to follow someone around in a public place as anyone else.
The LEOs? Give me a break. They detained, harassed, intimidated, humiliated, lied to about legal questions, intrusively searched, and confiscated property without cause from an innocent citizen. The LEOs families? Give me a break. The ill-conceived actions of a spouse can ruin the other's life up to and including causing the family to be put out on the street; just ask Ruth Madoff. I didn't propose any legal or government punishments for the families, just social shame. Social shame is an incredibly powerful tool that is grossly underutilized these days--if the wife and kids are ashamed that their dad was a bullying cop and were shunned by the community and forced to live incognito, it would give great pause to other cops who were considering bullying citizens.
The events of the OP provide yet more evidence that our once great country has descended to a level as worse or worse than East Germany and the USSR. While many citizens, either in those past places or here, may never encounter such abuse because they keep their heads down and never challenge authority, that doesn't make the abuse right. Call me a hypocrite if you want, but I want my country back.
You wrote this:
they and their families socially branded and ostracized so badly that decent people refuse to interact with them
Yeah, hide behind your claims that it's not governmen punishing them. What you suggest is far worse. And I makes you hypocritical in all that you say.
You not only want to punish the lives if innocent family members, you utterly wantto ruin their lives.
And notice, i am NOT talking about finical compensation, or putting them out on the street.
But if we take what you suggest and implement, I hope everyone in your family never violates a law, otherwise, your life may be ruined.
Originally Posted by
clrankin
So wonderful to know that it's legal for two airport monkeys to follow someone around harassing them.
How are the BDOs innocent here? When they were (presumedly) on the phone with the police, they obviously knew that taking pictures in the airport wasn't illegal. What was the concern-- that someone didn't want to bow down to them and kiss their shoes, or stand at attention and raise their right arm up and forward toward them?
The OP was posing no threat to aviation security, transportation security, or the airport by taking pictures. But instead of acting rationally, the crack BDO squad decided to harass someone until someone with the authority to detain showed up. It's not at all unlikely that the airport monkeys decided to tell the pigs something untrue, just as a retaliatory action for not bowing down and immediately recognizing their authority.
At any rate, we'll find out if DCA is much better at this game of "harass the innocent public for no reason" soon...
And i would argue the family members of the LEOs were no threat to the constitutional rights of the OP and to support the idea that thei lives should be entirely wrecked by association is more than just a breach of civil liberties.