...all of which has exactly zero to do with in-flight safety/security, and everything to do with law enforcement activities.

Individual TSA employees may hate readers more than they hate books.

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critic..._atlarge_crain


Starting as a teen, I've experienced a sinking feeling when someone has said, "You think you're better than everybody else, don't you?" It didn't take too many incidents for me to figure out that the speaker believed I was "better" than s/he was in some way, and there was little I could do about the speaker's feelings.

I think when many TSA employees encounter a traveler loaded down with 1-20 tomes, they feel intimidated, and angry with the traveler over how the traveler's obvious intellect has made the agent feel.

If it seems like the agent is irrationally hostile, and you're lugging Beowulf, Chaos, a half-completed New York Times crossword puzzle and the latest bestseller, just shut up and take your school-yard beating like the bracey-facey-four-eyed geek you are! It goes with the territory.

I'm 6'-4" tall, 270 pounds, and have a tremendous chip on my shoulders from taking that crap as a kid and as a teen.

I don't have to take that crap any more, and I don't.

But strangely, since I grew so large, far fewer people seem to want to dish it out to me any more. Dunno why...

I don't think TSA hates books.

I believe it's more like in the scene from the movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey, where the apes are gathered around the obelisk in fear.

Sure. Travel can be anything. I live on the road and like to some meaty academic books to read. Books like Bourdain's are enjoyable in small doses, but it's an appetizer, not a real book.

legacy
 

Since I'm a copyright lawyer, my use of those sites would be in bad form.

Besides, Mrs. Said has the right to the fruits of her husband's literary labors.

Answer to the thread's question: Of course they do. Books are another of those "sandboxes of the rich", you know, like CPB and NPR.

Well, I can't argue with that.

You could trivially satisfy it buy buying a dead-tree copy at retail and then pirating the e-copy; it may not be legal, and it may violate moral rights, but in a practical sense the author (or in this case his estate) is getting paid.

Keep in mind that many people respond this way when they can't develop a rational response to your argument.