The difference is that you have a right to walk a public street.

Flying on a airlines is not a right, its a travel choice made in a non-public setting. You can choose to not go to the airport.

The Ghandi quote above is nice, but mis-directed. In this case the pilot wasn’t dealing with the state, he was dealing with low-level enforcement officers in a corporate setting, not a public institution.

See previous comment regarding “corporate setting” being a red herring.

In your view what WOULD be a way to confront The State other than by confronting those doing The State’s dirty work?

We need more people to realize they can stand up to the TSA. Every time they detain an innocent dissenter, it undermines their power. If enough people refuse and we see them for the blight to security, safety, and freedom that they are, the government will have to change its tune. The government won’t let up until it becomes a political black eye.

Even in this age of fear-mongering and war-mongering, we have a right to freedom and a right to decency. Don’t let the government take that away from you.

The difference is that you have a right to walk a public street.

So, in your view my only travel option that is a right is walking. (By the way, the law takes a dim view of those walking in freeways, although they are publicly funded.)

Flying on a airlines is not a right, its a travel choice made in a non-public setting.

The “non-public” thing is still a red herring. Many airports are built with public support. Many are operated by public entities. The TSA is a government organ.

You can choose to not go to the airport.

I can choose not to do a lot of things — exercise free speech, bathe, vote, eat, whatever. Your point?

I don’t disagree, and I don’t think its not a pain in the arse. I would prefer not to be screened by either method, either.

But my point is that flying is NOT an inalienable right. You can choose to not travel, and you will never have to go through the scanner or get a pat-down.

Traveling overseas (or anywhere) by air is a convenience, and may be necessary for work, to see loved ones, to vacation, but it’s not an inalienable right.

My point about the space being privately owned isn’t a red herring; its an unfortunate truth – You are not afforded the same rights in a private or semi-private setting (an airport, a shopping mall, a movie theater) that you have on a city (public) street or other public locale.

This lack of convenience isn’t a lack of loss of rights or freedom and should not be even considered in the same realm as the right to your privacy within your own home, the right to vote, the right to practice the religion of your choice, the right to be treated equally-no matter your color. Calling a lack of convenience a loss of rights diminishes those actual rights.

“In your view what WOULD be a way to confront The State other than by confronting those doing The State’s dirty work?”

A tail that small is never going to wave the dog.

If you don’t want to follow the rules, get the rules changed. The TSA drone has no power or authority to enact any such change. Its a useless gesture.

But again, the main point here is that flying is not an inalienable right.

http://www.salon.com/technology/ask_the_pilot/2008/07/11/askthepilot283/print.html

http://www.salon.com/technology/ask_the_pilot/2005/06/10/askthepilot140/print.html

Something I didn’t know until I followed the link just now from the 2007 article to the 2005 one: “The requirement that pilots and flight attendants undergo checkpoint screening was imposed by the FAA after the crash of a Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) flight in 1987. A recently fired ground worker, David Burke, used his credentials, which the airline had failed to recover, to carry a concealed handgun onto flight 1771 from Los Angeles to San Francisco. En route, he shot both pilots and nosed the airplane into the ground near Harmony, Calif., killing all 44 on board”. Still doesn’t make sense for the pilots, though.

You can choose to not travel

Restricting travel rights is Fascism 101. People have jobs that require travel. They have friends and relatives to visit in far-off places. Have you forgotten the pursuit of happiness?

i’ve flown out of small airports with almost no security, and connected to larger airports. i could have had anything on me.

anybody with serious malicious intent can find a way to circumvent such a complex and distributed system.

much of this only provides an illusion of security at best.

John F. Kennedy said all someone needs is a willingness to trade his life for the President’s, if that is true then the same applies to this sort of situation.

the truth is we are never really secure or safe no matter how many freedoms we give up, all we can do is choose how we live and the quality of that life. personally i choose freedom over subjugation.

it is that same types of lack of freedom and subjugation that creates the breeding ground for terrorism in the first place. does anyone think happy free people choose to blow themselves and others up?

Not at all – but I made the point earlier that there are many ways to travel, and air-travel is merely the most convenient.

And again, yes I agree that its a pain, and inconvenient – but calling an inconvenience a loss of freedom is a gross overstatement and diminishes the loss of true rights.

If you ask me, I think the multinational corporations have scored the most points so far.

http://img843.imageshack.us/img843/350/bodyscanpic.jpg

Pretty detailed, huh?

More importantly, I can “choose not to accept totalitarian thuggery”. How about that?

Anyway, it’s not a valid argument. How about these examples: “Well, I know your Islamic militants knocked down your buildings, but you can choose not to have buildings.” “Well, I know your car was stolen, but you can choose not to have a car.” “Well, I know your daughter was murdered, but you could have chosen not to have children.”

What’s to prevent it from happening even with the “improved” security measures? The majority of the ones that are stopped are stopped _before_ getting to the airport. There are plenty of dangerous items that still get onto planes. Hell, Woz is known to smuggle steak knives on damn near every flight he takes. But seriously, these security measures _don’t actually help_. The _ONLY_ thing they do is make people _FEEL_ more secure. A real terrorist could probably get around them pretty easily.

Hell, I’ve brought “banned” items on flights before. I have a friend who brings full bottles of shampoo and toiletries on every flight, never takes them out of his bag, and they’re _never_ found. Not once. And he flies quite frequently. So clearly the liquids limit doesn’t work at all. The ban on knives doesn’t work at all. And when anyone with half a brain could improvise a deadly weapon out of a camera or two, what the hell is the point anyway?

So no, the new security measures don’t make me feel safer. Actually, the only thing they do is make me avoid flying. If anything, they make me feel _less_ safe.

Of course, the thing that _really_ scares me about flying isn’t the terrorists. It’s the airlines. For example, a flight I was on about a year ago – we were on the runway, the engines were powering up, we were about to go…and then they tell us ‘oh hey, we just discovered that the hydraulics aren’t working, so we can’t leave yet’. The plane was on the runway and about to take off before they discovered _it was broken!_. And then they made us sit there in the plane for 5 hours. Then we had to sit in the terminal overnight. Then they finally tell us they can’t get us home for a week, but they’ll only pay for two nights at the hotel…etc.

Whenever I have a choice, I’ll take a train. More comfortable, and no security _at all_. And unless you’re going the entire way across the country, it’ll probably be faster too.

there are many ways to travel, and air-travel is merely the most convenient.

BS. That same argument could be made about boats, cars, walking, etc. What forms of travel do you consider a right? There are lots of freedoms that you could claim aren’t inalienable rights that I would still fight to keep. Not all of us are so eager to give away all of our freedoms for the illusion of security.

Where does it stop?

And furthermore, say I want to take the train one day. Say all the same measures have been enacted. Say I decide, hey, no, I’d rather not be seen naked. Say then I’m told, “well, if you want on the train, you’ll have to be frisked.” And I say, “well, I don’t want to be frisked, so I guess I won’t be taking the train today.”

Forgetting all the other issues with security theater for the moment, the thing that puzzles me is that how you think the proper way for that story to end is being detained and question like a common criminal- in other words, being automatically considered a *threat*. It’s the same old argument- honest men have nothing to fear from the police, and it’s still a lie.

Even accepting the security theater, why should I just…not take the train? Leave the station?

calling an inconvenience a loss of freedom is a gross overstatement and diminishes the loss of true rights.

Your definition of ‘true rights’ has the quasi-religious tone that I associate with concepts like ‘natural law’. Why is the right to free speech a true right and the right to free travel a frivolity? You seem to have swallowed whole an arbitrary set of pre-digested ideas.

Is travel by car, train, boat, motorcycle not a right either, or is just flying that’s not a right? The amount of public money that has gone into airline terminals and bailouts for said airlines makes flying just as public as walking down the street, which we both agree is also a right.

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

Before this incident took place this guy had already decided his “freedom” was worth more than his job. He’s obviously prepared to live with the consequences of losing his job. I don’t agree with his reasoning but I support his right to refuse a pat-down and leave the terminal. Getting into an argument with screeners and law enforcement is pointless.

Backscatter scans at airports will save us from the jabberwock!

I haven’t had any bad experiences at airports yet, but the backscatter or thorough inspection by someone I don’t know just makes me uncomfortable. I just want to fly somewhere, leave me alone.

Next time, can you concentrate the obscene insults in one part of your comment so I don’t have to pick through the whole thing?

We have the theatre at the airport because they can get away with it. It would cripple a city like New york or London to try and apply airport style security to trains and buses.

It seems to me that, odious though they are, these machines and the alternative pat-down do serve a legitimate purpose. Suppose someone decides to blow up a plane. They seal some explosives inside plastic so they can’t be sniffed, and put some down each pants leg, inside their undies, etc. The metal detector wouldn’t catch that.

Now: it may well be that most of the TSA grunts don’t know the above rationale and are just following orders; it’s quite likely that some of them like to abuse their power and make people respect their authoritah; and there’s not much anyone can do about it until enough people get mad enough to pressure Congress to change the laws. I’m also under the impression that some European countries have managed fine so far without such measures.

Nevertheless, given the above possibly legitimate rationale for the scanning, can we rationally tell them “no”?

As I said, I’m boarding a plane in two days, so I’d like to hear some thoughts on the issue. Note, those like Grimnir, I said “thought”, not reason- and evidence-free ranting.

(No snark intended. Seriously, what is to be done about it? Shall I write a letter to my congressperson?)

If I’m going to have my privacy violated, then I demand everyone be witness.

I like the comment from sapere_aude who brings up a reasonable alternative to these invasive procedures– employ more dogs:

“MythBusters recently demonstrated that it’s IMPOSSIBLE to conceal any odor-producing substance in such a way that a trained sniffer dog can’t find it. Put bomb-sniffing dogs at all airport security checkpoints, and you have no legitimate need for a body scanner or pat down to find explosives.”

We did. we installed secured Cockpit doors. And just what has prevented the last few terrorist attacks in the US on airplanes? Oh that’s right THE PASSENGERS. Not the TSA, not airline staff. People like you and me.

What I would like to see is other pilots stand up like this. Betcha that would change things real quick…