I don't always agree with eyecue (posting history will demonstrate that!), but he doesn't strike me as an apologist.

Many people develop a blind spot with regard to their own organization, team, political party...it becomes black-and-white, us-vs. 'all others'. It's hard to see clearly if you start from the basic assumption that what you and yours are doing is always right.

The only remedy is to walk a mile (or more) in the other guy's shoes, to be personally on the receiving end of policies or practices one defends. It happens all too seldom.

There's apparently a documented standard for assessing which 'assistive' medical devices or 'dual use' devices are permitted. I doubt that eyecue had anything to do with making that rule up, and I'm sure the reasoning to support it sounds plausible if you don't question it and you are presented with all the deadly things that could happen if you don't enforce it.

Then a pax unwittingly encounters the one airport in his travels where this secret, unavailable to the public rule is enforced and common sense is not.

Sad to say, I believe eyecue and possibly one other TSA employee who post on this forum have made it clear that even when they have seen opportunity for improvement and made suggestions, they have been ignored. They encounter the same deaf ears that pax encounter.

I've seen criticisms from TSA apologists that suggest pax should understand how tough the job is. I do give that every consideration, but at the end of the day, when I try to walk in a TSO's shoes, I still can't see myself shouting, belittling, lying or making up a rule when I don't know the correct answer, karate-chopping genitals just to show somebody the power of my uniform, threatening DY...T, etc. I get plenty of stress in my own job, but I don't believe in retaliation, unprofessional behavior, or taking out my frustrations on other people - whether or not they are the source of the frustration.

I wish a few more TSOs would try to walk in my shoes for a change. And yes, sometimes that does include you, eyecue.

I always reply to that with, "Having a difficult job is no excuse for doing your job poorly. "

I also say, "Having an important job is no excuse for being an arrogant, abusive, jackass."

Of course, this falls on deaf ears to bothTSA and lots of LEOs in this country.

That's exactly what they've looked like for the last few weeks though.

Thoroughly spanked on several subjects in several threads and simply keeps on trotting out the party line.

When the only thing you have to sell is BS you need to be an excellent salesman.


Eyecue can't sell.

For eyecue, here is the question, that you claimed to answer, but did not---now nicely bolded and red, without the weasel word (confiscation):
If yes, then you and I disagree on what a reasonable threat is and there isn't much point in discussing/debating it anymore.

If no, then would you care to explain why you are defending what happened? I'm sincerely and seriously curious.

I'm simply curious if he, personally, without dodging or semantics, believes that taking away an obvious medical device that clearly looks like a toy is a reasonable action because it poses a real threat. In this case, he either:

1) believes this was appropriate,
2) refuses to admit that TSA was wrong, or
3) unable to tell the difference.

If he actually addresses the point of my question, then we shall see which it is.

eyecue, you're getting flogged pretty badly in this thread, and I am sorry about that. I hop you understand our outrage at what we perceive to be nothing more than a blatant attempt at theft under color of authority, poorly disguised as a security measure.

However, you still haven't addressed my questions, and these are serious, legitimate questions.

I am genuinely curious to know the answers to these questions.

There must have been other big men showing up with big canes in past. Does big man/big cane automatically result in this situation? Or was it because of the man, or the actual cane?

I'm sure it's obvious what my opinion is, but I figure it can't hurt to state it plainly.

In my opinion, this was either:

A) A case of a TSO who wished to steal a really cool cane from a man (whom he did not recognize as being somewhat famous and having a huge Twitter following) under color of authority with a flimsy made-up story about the cane being somehow prohibited.

OR

B) A case of TSOs who were genuinely too stupid to realize that lightsabers are not real, and were trying to prohibit the cane on the basis that it was a "lifelike replica weapon".

eyecue's explanations of "dual use items" and "value as a bludgening item" have no legitimacy in my eyes whatsoever.

If it was the cane then the question then is why?

I know that old fashioned wood canes are moderately heavy for their size. I don't know what a large one in the size of the light saber cane would weight. I also know that acrylics weight about .0426 lb/cubic inch. I don't have the weight of wood.

In my opinion such a long cane would be a poor weapon in the confines of an airplane cabin and given that TSA was about to allow hockey sticks, golf clubs, and other such items in cabins and then claim that the cane was a weapon just doesn't hold water.

I suggest the agenda was to confiscate and retain for personal use. Social media brought light to the matter rather quickly foiling the plans of these TSA screeners.

In the confines of an aircraft, clearly eyecue's statements are meaningless: by definition, "bludgening" requires the ability to swing something. You'd do more damage with an aluminium framed netbook than you could ever do with a lucite cane that will shatter at first impact (even if you could swing it).

He has to.

Confirmation for eyecue's edification that the TSA does, in fact, confiscate:

http://www.app.com/article/20121220/...un-shells-home

Actually, I'm going to disagree with you on that point.

First, blunt force trauma can be inflicted with a fairly minimal swing. Straight up and down with a heavy, solid object, a person could inflict serious, possibly fatal damage, in just the length of their arm; so, in an aircraft cabin, just raising your arm up to ceiling height is enough swing space.

Second, lucite is not one of those fragile, brittle plastics like those used in child's toys. The very fact that canes are made from lucite should be an indicator of it's strength, but add to that the fact that such a large man as Peter Mayhew has been using one for several years shows just how strong and durable this stuff is. From the photos, I'd guess that the cane is 1.5"-2" in diameter and about 3'-4' long (around 4-5cm x 92-122cm). A solid lucite rod of that size actually would be every bit as effective a weapon as a solid oak rod of the same dimensions.

The issue, for me, is not whether the cane could be used as a weapon, since it clearly could, but whether it poses any greater danger than any of the other millions of wooden and metal canes which are permitted on aircraft by TSA without any further examination or determination necessary.

It's a cane. There is nothing unusual about it other than its wowzer-cool factor, and it is absolutely no more dangerous than any other cane which is allowed on a plane.

I guess the stupidity of the incident can be summed up as TSOs in question drew an arbitrary, blatantly false, non-existent differentiation between objects which have no appreciable difference in threat levels to any other reasonable person. And they did so, in my opinion, with the intent to steal the man's cane under color of authority. The only other possibility is that TSOs were actually dumb enough to think that lightsabers actually exist.

Everything else is a just a bunch of smelly monkey crap thrown in the air to justify the unjustifiable.

As well as extortion, bullying, and just plain mean-old-dog evilness.

Wading in at this point could be tricky, but I am not squeamish about trying.

There are two things completely unrelated. The first is that it is not whether it is a weapon. It is not whether they want it for themselves. The policy is pretty clear that simulation of weapons or non-functional weapons and even weapon parts are prohibited. It is clearly a simulated weapon, but a fictional one. It does not matter. It is one of those cases where sensible rules become nonsensical in specific applications.

2nd, on my flight Friday was a gentleman that was carrying a cane made like a shillelagh. I think it was an real one used as a cane. See second one from top on this page for one similar. Now this IS a weapon. A real honest-to-goodness weapon. Not a fake. Not a replica. The older gentleman was clearly using it as a cane, and it was allowed through.

It the the problem of variable rules applied variably leading to variable results. Even I could see the problem with that.