Boggie Dog

Instead of calling it AIT call it what it really is, an Electronic Strip Search!

ElizabethConley

Well Lemme see:

I scan the dairy department thoroughly each time I visit the grocer, praying to spot John Pistole's face on a milk carton...

Digging deeper:

I have a catch and release policy wrt cockroaches, but if one scuttles across the kitchen floor in a smurf suit he'll never stand a chance...

hmmm:

I'm sure there's more. I'm gonna go munch a few cookies to fuel my brain.

studentff

There is zero chance of enhanced pat-downs causing cancer. There is nearly zero risk of any long-term injury from the pat-down that stays undetected for a period of time. Any injury caused by the pat-down is likely to cause immediate sharp pain, meaning that the screener who caused the injury can be identified and hopefully held accountable.

I think another factor for many passengers is that opting-out of the scanner is the only "power" that TSA concedes to passengers. Opting out is rejecting TSA's default actions and forcing them to do extra work. If TSA made the pat-downs primary and the scanners secondary, I think a lot of "us" would choose the scanners.

I think both the strip-search machine and enhanced retaliatory patdowns (any protocol that calls for pushing up against the genitals four times is more about retaliation than screening) applied without individualized suspicion are disgusting, un-American, and unconstitutional. But the only option that TSA gives us to assert ourselves (while still flying) is to opt out of the strip search machine.

Caradoc

Cue resident TSO lies about not touching genitals in 5, 4, 3, 2...

PTravel

I believe both the scan and the grope are serious constitutional violations. However, under no circumstances will I submit to an x-ray scan. I'm not exposing myself to ionizing radiation because it is the "lesser" constitutional violation.

ElizabethConley

Which is why the pat down remains the reasonable choice, until health concerns are addressed. Revulsion at being mauled by a government thug is unpleasant, but it passes a lot faster than most cancer treatments.

TheGolfWidow

Although I am *totally* opposed to both the body scanners and the patdowns on a personal level, at least with the gropetastic form of screenery, it leaves one with a socialized option for responding to it immediately. (One could scream or physically recoil when touched inappropriately by a screener. That is a socialized response to having a stranger touch one's genitals in public, -- but not so much for having one's picture taken at the airport.) The other things that tip the scales are safety concerns and the possibilities of what might happen to the individual scanner images. For all of these reasons, I'll take the grope rather than the scanner.

ElizabethConley

The same lies again and again, like a broken record. I don't bother to respond to that garbage any more.

nachtnebel

If human beings had been intended to perform those strip search and sex organ groping actions in the way they are performed and on the victims they perform them on (innocent travelers), blindly, slavishly, without any regard for them, and if humans had been intended to submit to such behavior, we would not have been given brains.

This is nothing other than violence. Just as the absolute power wielded by the slave owner over the slave, it is damaging to those who do these things and it is damaging to those who have these things done to them. Beyond the indignity and fundamental violation of liberty, this strip searching and sex organ groping sends so many messages to the victims about their power and your helplessness. It is destructive to a free people.

a price will be paid for this and is already being paid.

ElizabethConley

I wish I had said it this way. Thanks.

MikeMpls

How often do you fly? And how many encounters have you had with the Nude-O-Scope?

Many (most?) people who pass through the Nude-O-Scope end up being groped anyway, so you'll be driving or walking soon enough (after you pay your $11,000 fine for refusing to complete the screening process).

And what happens if the grope comes up while you are a few thousand miles away from home?

The only way out for people who do not want to be molested is not to fly, period. There is no other escape unless you have lots of $11,000 bills in your wallet.

mlbcard

That's my decision. As much as I like traveling, my dignity and my constitutional rights are worth more. Since money talks louder than the Constitution these days, as more frequent flyers stop flying because of this, the airlines will feel the pain and maybe something will be done about it.

NotaCriminal

ElizabethConley basically said what I would say, but probably more succinctly and elegantly, right down to the "baggage". Suffice to say, WillCAD, you aren't the only one.

And this is why I will opt for the grope if I have to fly at all (I've cut out almost all air travel since October). I'm not getting violated twice if I can help it.

FlyMeToTheLooneyBin

Every time I fly out of a major airport that has the scopes, I look for lines, no matter how long, that just have the conventional metal detectors. I wait patiently in those. It is very frustrating how they treat us like cattle.

However, IF I have to go through either the pat down on the NoS, I choose the NoS for the reasons the OP listed. I just don't like being felt up. Fine, see my naked outline on a computer and hopefully blur my face and not see me. Anyway, I've done this many times, and every time, they haven't run me through a secondary grope, so for me at least, it's grope free.

exbayern

I am one of the many, many travellers who have no choice - we simply are physically unable to use the WBI, and the TSA seems to have overlooked this and punishes us all in the same fashion as those who have conciously chosen to opt out.

Having said that, even if I could use the WBI I would opt out as a form of protest. I have posted many links to German media re the WBI tests and how up to 75% of those using the scanners (voluntarily) still have to be physically checked. I object to the use of a costly tool which is of questionable benefit, and which is giving kickbacks to a former government official. Then there are the questions about privacy and morality, not to mention the potential health impact.

Unfortunately the recent 'bang downs' I have received often cause significant pain, which is another reality for those who cannot use the WBI.