Tracking Suspicious Activity...or TSA for short.

There is much talk recently about the TSA and airport security. Finally deciding to put my two cents onto the Internet, I give you my thoughts.

National security is of vital importance. Since September 11, 2001 airport security has been amped up. However, since then there have been several attempts of terrorist activity on planes. May I recall your memory to the Christmas day underwear bomber, and just last month with suspicious packages aboard flights from Yemen. We should all be wondering how these attempts were not stopped before they got on the plane. For instance, the underwear bomber was already on the “DO NOT ENTER LIST.” Why wasn’t he stopped before getting on the plane!? Kudos to those passengers who stopped this guy.

Just recently, the Department of Homeland Security has decided to adopt a policy of full body scanners. The body scanners are supposed to detect any possible threat while looking at an x-ray of you naked. From what I have heard and read, it cannot detect instruments of destruction inside of a person. Hopefully, the metal detectors can do that.

If one feels insecure about the full body scanners there is another option, the more “traditional” option: pat-downs. TSA and airport security used to have to use the back of their hands to pat passengers down, now they can use their palms to get a “better feel.” You read that right, TSA officials can get a quick feel and grab if they so choose. Better yet, you might get asked to go through the body scanner too! You better not be shy if you are planning on flying anytime soon!

Now you might be wondering what the big deal is. Why are people getting all fired up about this issue? Well there are few explanations: 1) people feel that their personal privacy is being violated and 2) people are thinking the government is being too intrusive. Remember back to the Patriot Act and my last post on the Patriot Act, people thought that this is going too far; the government is getting too involved in our personal lives. Well, this issue, I feel, falls into the same category.

From what I have read and gather, the images from the full body scanner depict us completely naked. This might not be that big of deal if it prevents attacks on the plane. However, these images are stored somewhere; we don’t know exactly where but the government now has naked pictures of us. Hopefully they have a warning on there that says, “You must be 18 years or older to view these pictures.”

The government can claim that there have been no successful attacks on our country, via planes, since the full body scanners have been implemented. This is a true statement. However, the government seems to be going against their ideals on personal privacy. For instance, in the Supreme Court case Rowe V. Wade, the Supreme Court ruled that the women have the right to privacy. Wouldn’t one think that, if this issue of full body scanners reaches the Supreme Court that the Court will have to strike it down since it is an attack against personal privacy? Obviously you can refuse to go through the body scanner and you can refuse to get the pat-down but that means you might get fined and you definitely will not be getting on your flight.

One would think that it is hard to argue against the government, and this is also a true statement. However, on this issue, it seems that the people are winning. Many people feel that the TSA is going too far. I tend to agree with those that are outraged. This has gone so far that one passenger has chose to strip down instead of getting touched by a TSA agent. Even worse, one passenger got so embarrassed that he peed his pants. I am quite surprised that the Department of Homeland Security has decided to keep going with the full body scanners after all of this outrage.

The TSA has said that they will have the scans on a minimal during this holiday season. Hopefully the TSA comes up with a better way of screening passengers because this is not acceptable. Does this mean going back to racial profiling? Probably not. Just to clarify, I am not too worried about going through the scanner because I have nothing to hide and if it is for safety measures. However, I feel like this might be going a bit too far and I am not too sure how comfortable I would be with some TSA agent grabbing my junk. But I strongly believe there has to be a better way for those who would prefer not to go through the scanners…