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Journal sillypixie's Journal: Airport Security is still an oxymoron... 41

Journal by sillypixie

This is a tribute to the photo-taking and fingerprinting that I will have to submit to next time I enter the US...

George Carlin wrote the rant below before 9/11 ever happened - some of what he says is eerily predictive, and seems a little blasphemous now. I still think that his basic premise rings true though. Personally, I think y'all are trading away some very basic privacy for the privilege of feeling safe. And you're at the edge of a very slippery slope, and each time something new happens in spite of all the surveillance and tracking, you'll lose a bit more freedom, in the name of 'National Security'.

That's just my opinion though, and my non-american status makes that opinion peripheral at best. I will of course submit to whatever rules the US makes, in return for the privilege of working there. Anything else would be a tad hypocritical. I just hope y'all know what you're doing...

Pixie

Note: there are expletives below (it is George Carlin, after all). If you can't handle the f-word, you should probably sit this one out...

I'm getting tired of security at the airport, There's too much of it. I'm tired of some fat chick with a double-digit IQ and a triple-digit income rootin' around inside my bag for no reason and never finding anything. Haven't found anything yet. Haven't found one bomb in one bag. And don't tell me, "Well, the terrorists know their bags are going to be searched, so now they're leaving their bombs at home." There are no bombs! The whole thing is fuckin' pointless'

And it's completely without logic. There's no logic at all. They'll take away a gun but let you keep a knife. Well, what the fuck is that? In fact, there's a whole list of lethal objects they allow you to take on board. Theoretically, you could take a knife, an ice pick, a hatchet, a straight razor, a pair of scissors, a chain saw, six knitting needles and a broken whiskey bottle, and the only thing they would say to you is, "That bag has to fit all the way under the seat in front of you."

And if you didn't take a weapon on board, relax. After you've been flying for about an hour, they're gonna bring you a knife and fork! They actually give you a fucking knife. It's only a table knife, but you could kill a pilot with a table knife. It might take a couple of minutes.

Especially if he's hefty. But you could get the job done. If you really wanted to kill the prick. Shit, there are a lot of things you could use to kill a guy. You could probably beat a guy to death with the Sunday New York Times, couldn't you? Suppose you just have really big hands. Couldn't you strangle a flight attendant? Shit, you could probably strangle two of them, one with each hand. That is, if you were lucky enough to catch 'em in that little kitchen area. Just before they break out the fuckin' peanuts. But you could get the job done. If you really cared enough.

So why is it they allow a man with big, powerful hands to get on board an airplane? I'll tell you why. They know he's not a security risk, because he's already answered the three big questions. Question number one: "Did you pack your bags yourself?"

"No, Carrot Top packed my bags. He and Martha Stewart and Florence Henderson came over to the house last night, fixed me a lovely lobster Newburg, gave me a full body massage with sacred oils from India, performed a four-way around-the-world and then packed my bags. Next question." "Have your bags been in your possession the whole time?"

"No. Usually the night before I travel-just as the moon is rising-I place my suitcases out on the street corner and leave them there, unattended, for several hours. Just for good luck. Next question."

"Has any unknown person asked you to take anything on board?"

"Well, what exactly is an 'unknown person'? Surely everyone is known to someone. In fact, just this morning, Kareem and Youssef Ali ben Gabba seemed to know each other quite well. They kept joking about which one of my suitcases was the heaviest."

And that's another thing they don't like at the airport. Jokes. You can't joke about a bomb. Well, why is it just jokes? What about a riddle? How about a limerick? How about a bomb anecdote? You know, no punch line, just a really cute story. Or suppose you intended the remark not as a joke but as an ironic musing? Are they prepared to make that distinction? I think not! And besides, who's to say what's funny?

Airport security is a stupid idea. It's a waste of money and it's there for only one reason: to make white people feel safe. That's all it's for. To provide a feeling, an illusion, of safety in order to placate the middle class. The authorities know they can't make airplanes safe; too many people have access. You'll notice that drug smugglers don't seem to have a lot of trouble getting their little packages on board, do they? No. And God bless them, too.

And by the way, an airplane flight shouldn't be completely safe. You need a little danger in your life. Take a fuckin' chance, will ya? What are you gonna do, play with your prick for another 30 years? Are you gonna read People and eat at Wendy's till the end of time? Take a fuckin' chance! Besides, even if they made all of the airplanes completely safe, the terrorists would simply start bombing other places that are crowded: pawnshops, crack houses, titty bars and gang bangs. You know, entertainment venues. The odds of your being killed by a terrorist are practically zero. So I say, relax and enjoy the show.

You have to be realistic about terrorism. Ya gotta be a realist: Certain groups of people--Muslim fundamentalists, Christian fundamentalists, Jewish fundamentalists, and just plain guys from Montana--are going to continue to make life in this country very interesting for a long, long time. That's the reality. Angry men in combat fatigues talking to God on a two-way radio and muttering incoherent slogans about freedom are eventually going to provide us with a great deal of entertainment.

Especially after your stupid fuckin' economy collapses all around you, and the terrorists come out of the woodwork. And you'll have anthrax in the water supply and sarin gas in the air conditioners; there'll be chemical and biological suitcase bombs in every city, and I say, "Relax, enjoy it! Enjoy the show! Take a fuckin' chance. Put a little fun in your life." To me, terrorism is exciting. I think the very idea that someone might set off a bomb in Macy's and kill several hundred people is exciting and stimulating, and I see it as a form of entertainment!

But I also know most Americans are soft, frightened, unimaginative people who have no idea there's such a thing as dangerous fun. And they certainly don't recognize good entertainment when they see it. I have always been willing to put myself at great personal risk for the sake of entertainment. And I've always been willing to put you at great personal risk for the same reason.

As far as I'm concerned, all of this airport security--the cameras, the questions, the screening, the searches--is just one more way of reducing your liberty and reminding you that they can fuck with you any time they want, as long as you're willing to put up with it. Which means, of course, any time they want. Because that's the way Americans are now. They're always willing to trade away a little of their freedom for the feeling, the illusion--of security.

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Airport Security is still an oxymoron... More

Airport Security is still an oxymoron...

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  • Yeah, we gave up rights, but we'll get them back.

    People will slowly get back on track, demand rights back, and get them... until something else happens like a terrorist attack. Then we lose them all for safety for a while, slowly get back on track, etc...

    Its just the nature of these things.
    • Yeah, we gave up rights, but we'll get them back.

      Will we? Laws are slow. Undoing laws is slower. Can't we just reprogram people to not be so reactionary?
    • Bet you can't name more than 5 rights that we lost at a federal level that we ever got back. Let me get you started:
      • Getting piss-drunk (prohibition)
      • Well, you could start by including pretty much every law that's been declared unconstitutional. That's normally how we get rights back. Googling "repeal law" gets mostly state and foreign laws (lots on the California law allowing illegal aliens to have drivers' licenses), but very little on the federal level. Mostly efforts to repeal state laws, primarily those requiring motorcycle helmets and forbidding homosexual conduct. Taxes are from time to time repealed, but I'm not sure that those could be class
    • I don't think that this one you will get back, I think that this has been on the agenda for a long time for reasons other than 'terrorism', and national security is just the easiest way to push it through.

      The data-mining possibilities of this system are endless. You can make a pretty good business case for the system regardless of national security, as long as you don't take the constitution & amendments into consideration... once they hook the airport db into interpol, the fbi, etc, you could set up

      • It will be a very useful system. Just not for detecting terrorists...

        I said the same thing about the mandate that the position of cell phones be tracked to a certain number of meters. So it makes emergency services calls easier to dispatch. It also means that the exact whereabouts of investigative reporters can be tracked at all times, and someone with enough power to have access to the data can quash their story in any number of ways just by getting to the sources first. That's just one of the least nas

        • Ooh, interesting, I never thought of that angle - of course, my musings on that topic were more on the McCarthyism angle - if you know that some politically undesirable groups are meeting in a specific area at at a specific time, you find out all the cell phones used in the area, and imprison/interrogate/implicate them... I'm sure I can think up lots of other scenarios, each with various degrees of far-fetchedness (-;

          Man, I'm turning into a conspiracy theorist... pretty soon I'll be a bag-lady living on t
          • McCarthyist revivals are just one abuse facilitated by such things; I'm more concerned with the various "conveniences" which are creating a ready-made surveillance state for anyone able to grab the reins. The "I-Pass" style of radio transponders for tollways make a moderately good tracking scheme for vehicles using them, and the records they leave have already been subpoenaed in civil cases such as divorces; I'm sure the police agencies have even fewer difficulties in their way of using that data. Combine t
            • That's why I'd have them all removed. After all, any food that's been sitting in a dumpster for a couple of days would be soft enough to gum, right? Hmm, what would a toothless smilie look like.... S-;

              I suppose that expecting that a little thing like privacy would be enough to stop any government from using the advanced capabilities of modern technology is perhaps naive. Maybe what needs to happen, is that privacy-loving hackers need to start putting in back-doors. And hoping to never have to use them,

              • You know, I could turn this post to a hollywood movie script, and it would make mega-millions of bucks, eh? Doncha think?

                I thought that the idea would make a good novel, but to explain the ideas behind it without trivializing them would take a few hundred pages (you would have to explain the DMCA just for starters). To make it work as a Hollywood script it would have to be no more than novella length. Bad Things happen when this difference is disregarded; recall what happened to Dune and cringe.

                And yes,

                • It sure would be nice to have a world where we don't need cautionary tales. :(

                  True.

                  Personally, I imagine that no matter how unique and accurate you could make it, it would be bastardized by hollywood anyways. The hero, no matter how much of a geek, would always have to be good-looking, and the technology would be boiled down tho a graphics screen with little red & purple dots, and some pop-up screens that say "ACCESS DENIED" and "PASSWORD ACCEPTED", or whatever. There will always be a nerdy side

  • I somehow must of managed to land myself on a watch list. There has not been a trip in the last 18 months that I haven't been flagged for 'extra screening'. For me, I don't mind being screened as I understand the logic of the process and the reailty of how important it is in a post 9/11 world. It does get annoying after the first couple of times especially when they constantly remove items from the bags that I stow under the plane. Yeah, I know nailclippers are not carry on items anymore so they go below wh
    • What kind of stuff are they removing from checked baggage? I'd think that anything short of an actual bomb (or the equivalent flammable material) would be OK. You could probably improvise a bomb from components in different suitcases, but the odds of success would likely be quite low.
      • Stuff removed from my checked bags... they have taken 3 toenail clippers and a package of disposable razors.

        It just doesn't make sense that they do that but they do. They are nice enough to leave you a little green tag that says an item has been removed and a handwritten line about what they took(no explanation why just what the item was). I don't see how items when stored in checked bags would possibly pose a threat but I assure you they have taken these things from me.
        • That's bizarre. OK, here's my theory. I saw some pictures a while back of a woman contortionist who could fit herself into a suitcase. Maybe they're worried that you have an accomplice packed in another suitcase, who will (once the plane is in the air) emerge from the other suitcase, find your bags in the cargo hold, pull out a nail clippers, and hijack the plane. I think that they may have been watching too many bad movies. Next thing you know, laptops will be banned, so that you can't hack into the f
  • It's inane. Hell, issue a gun at the door, everyone armed? ok, fly!

    Let's think about airport security right now, shall we:
    1. You have the shops inside security, where you can buy many of the things you might have gotten confiscated. I've seen nailclippers for sale before.
    2. Lighters are still permissable and there is an oxygen source directly overhead your entire trip.
    3. You can buy(and frequently bring in yourself) high proof alcohol at the bar, and even on the plane. Bacardi 151 anybody?

    Security is u
    • Seems to me that anyone can kill people on an airplane any time - all they have to do is walk up to one of the emergency exits and pull the lever... maybe the plane won't crash, but as long as you don't mind being sucked out into the atmosphere, you could probably ensure that a few other people joined you for the ride...

      I absolutely agree that there is no such thing as undefeatable security. I believe that in order to be free, you have to be vulnerable. Once you get too afraid, you lose all your options.
      • and if it was, you'd be reading about it weekly.

        The emergency exit doors as well as the main doors are all larger than their openings. To remove them, you have to first pull them inward and then turn them at an angle so they'll fit out again. When you have 8 PSI (roughly 850 pounds per square foot, or several tons of pressure for an emergency exit) holding the egress door against its frame, you're not going to move it just by unlatching it and pulling.

        I absolutely agree that there is no such thing as und

        • Well crap, I guess that's why there aren't any parachutes for all us passengers then, hey? Can't get out even if we wanted to...

          Maybe this is a detail somebody should tell the movie writers. Ooh, if you are disgusted by movie physics, you should visit The Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics [intuitor.com] site, there are some really great analyses there... my favorite is the review of "Armageddon"... (snicker)...

          Pixie
          • If the airframe came apart in flight you'd lose pressurization and the doors could be opened without that particular difficulty. The problem is that you aren't likely to be able to get clear of (what remains of) the aircraft without getting killed. (In a mishap on takeoff or landing a parachute would be useless, and those categories account for most airline fatalities.) The aerobatic aircraft I've flown have canopies which slide wide open or jettison, or doors with hinge pins you remove by pulling a D-ring
            • Hmmm, you are right, people would need to get away from the flaming wreck that was their aircraft... so to continue my uneducated, yet entertaining (to me, anyways) flight of fancy on parachutes for airliners, really what you would need would be for every passenger seat to be an ejection seat, armed with airbags or rollbars or something to fend off the inevitibility of collisions with other ejectees. I guess if you eject everyone hard enough, you could clear the engines.

              I don't think you could put any c

              • this concept I'm proposing has holes in it you could drive a truck through (and hopefully you will), I might as well get crazier in my theories

                Mind over matter. If nobody minds, it doesn't matter.

                what you would need would be for every passenger seat to be an ejection seat, armed with airbags or rollbars or something to fend off the inevitibility of collisions with other ejectees. I guess if you eject everyone hard enough, you could clear the engines.

                What you'd need is something like ripple-fire, wher

                • Phew! Made it back - 7 hrs of air travel, for 8 hours of meetings, and everything else spent in airports or taxis...

                  Now back to the good stuff, I've been looking forward to seeing your post and continuing the craziness all day (-:

                  What you'd need is something like ripple-fire, where the seats leave the aircraft in sequence so that they don't collide. If the sequence went back-to-front and each seat opened a drogue 'chute as it cleared the empennage, it would be very unlikely for two seats to run into eac

                  • It's getting crazy at work and I don't know if I'll have time to write a proper response soon. :( I just wanted you to know that I'm not ignoring you.

                    Calgary... I blew through there on my last vacation. I'd have to re-check my albums to see if I spent any film there or saved it all for Banff. That part of the trip took a lot of coffee-power!

                    More later, if I'm lucky. I'd e-mail you, except you have no e-mail on your page. Just for your geekification, here's something on my current reading list: http://www [calphysics.org]

                    • I hope you didn't waste a single photo in Calgary - proximity to the Rockies is the single reason to exist here. There is also lots here for a geek to do, although my particular job always seems to take me elsewhere.

                      I'll leave my email address up for today - if you could write it down, you would then be able to drop me an email whenever you have time and/or inclination (-: In the meantime, I will upgrade my physics knowledge, just to be an interesting conversationalist - how brilliant that you have come
                    • I mailed you last night.
                  • Gah. Idiot "lameness filter" won't let me PREVIEW because of "too many junk characters". How stupid can you be, Taco?

                    passengers would be able to choose their ejection order, based on a graduated pay scale, of course, thus preying on the extremely nervous or extremely rich portions of the population.

                    Too complicated, and can you imagine the lawsuits if somebody's seat didn't go in the order they'd paid for? Much simpler to just make it back-to-front.

                    Also reassuring for the Christians. "And the last sha

  • This is a tribute to the photo-taking and fingerprinting that I will have to submit to next time I enter the US...

    I thought you were Canadian, in which case (unless you're working or getting married in the US) you don't need a visa, just the visa waiver - which is exempt from the "US-VISIT" requirements. Just sign the little "I am not a terrorist/drug dealer/Nazi war criminal/..." card, and go on through.

    • I frequently work on 2-4 month projects in the US, flying in on monday and out on friday, using a TN-1 visa. They will have plenty 'o fingerprints from me pretty soon.

      So they take my fingerprints on the way in. Then I blow up a bridge. If my attack is a suicide attack, and if I have a clean record before the attack, the fact that they have my fingerprints on file means NOTHING, and billions of dollars of security have not a hope in hell of preventing my attack. The only time the security works, is i
      • So they take my fingerprints on the way in. Then I blow up a bridge. If my attack is a suicide attack, and if I have a clean record before the attack, the fact that they have my fingerprints on file means NOTHING, and billions of dollars of security have not a hope in hell of preventing my attack.

        The fingerprinting isn't supposed to prevent an attack, it's supposed to help enforce immigration laws. (If the database is available to law enforcement, it will also help a great deal there.) In terms of an atta

  • I had to fly out quickly about two weeks before Christmas to deal with a problem related to my Aged Mum. For some reason, I was picked for the Full Security Treatment at my "home" airport, which is BWI. Some weird, chubby guy with a pony tail rooted through everything I had in my small backpack--no laptop or other electronics because it was a short, intense trip. But underwear, sox, that extra sweater, my cheap paperback novel, my toothbrush and paste--all got The Treatment. They did call a female attendan
    • Actually, the truth is, I never get hassled. Ever. I doubt that the additional measures will add to my airport frustration whatsoever. I'm young, caucasian, and well-groomed, with very predictable travel habits (tend to be at the same airport at the same time every week for 10-16 weeks), and I rarely get a second glance from anyone.

      I don't mind taking the extra time. I just hate the privacy implications.

      Interesting about the jewelry - do you make your own beads too?

      Pixie
      • Well, my feeling of the moment is that we're being sucked into a pit here and, being the size that we are, we're in danger of sucking a lot of other people right along with us. My immediate worry about this particular issue is that white folks, wherever they're from, aren't going to be subject to this as much as folks of color, wherever they're from. We'll set an immigration policy that harasses people who want to visit, vacation, or study while at the same time, legitimizing (for a price) illegal immigran
  • ...a while back. Good stuff!

    One big problem behind all of this is that most Americans have over-inflated egos and think that they're so important that the world would come to an end if they happened to die. (A lot of the bastards and bitches in Washington fall very well into this category.) Therefore they fear death. Therefore they are more than willing to live under a police state that seemingly seeks to protect their sad little lives, than to live in an open society, to take chances, to have the right t

  • Are Knitting Needles still permitted?
    If they are, they seem much more dangerous than a nail file.

    All I want to do is file my nails at 10,000 feet. Is that too much to ask?????

    OK, I'm just an obsessive-compulsive that has to have a nail file on hand at all times, and especially when I'm going to have a few hours of free time on my hands to notice that there is a slight imperfection in one of my nails and will be going crazy until I smooth it down. To say nothing of hangnails.
    • I'm flying monday - I'll see if I can find some yarn and needles, and I'll report back whether or not they get confiscated... I can't get in trouble for taking them in the 1st place, can I? Of course, I guess I should really have a few lines of yarn all knitted up -- crap, I don't know how to knit. How about a crochet hook? You could definitely get that into an ear or a nose, and cause some pain, couldn't you?

      (0:

      Pixie

      ps - now, when I see a little roughness in one of my fingernails, I just put my finge

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