I am inexpressibly saddened by this man's pain, and moved by his eloquent expression of it. This is relevant because many of us are here on this board after having endured similar traumatic violations at airport checkpoints. In fact, I recognized my own experiences in his story:

Later I found out that in addition to touching her swollen breasts – to protect the American citizenry – the employee had asked that she lift up her shirt. Not behind a screen, not off to the side – no, right there, directly in front of the hundred or so passengers standing in line. "I felt like a clown," my wife told me later. "On display for all these people, with the cotton panel on my pants and my stomach sticking out. When I sat down I just lost my composure and began to cry. That’s when you walked up."

...I was so disgusted I felt like vomiting. But that was just the beginning.

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I too have been molested at checkpoints, humiliated at checkpoints, forced to partially undress, and forced to endure having my breasts and other private parts of my body touched. None of this has anything to do with security. The TSA turns innocent travelers into shamed victims of physical abuse.

The responses from officials are all so reminiscent of abusers' statements to victims, it's frightening:

- you're overreacting
- you're hysterical
- you must be on drugs
- you're a crybaby
- that never happened, you're making it all up
- it'll be different from now on, I promise