They're not laughing at your naked fat anymore; they got rid of the backscatter machines last year (after blowing who knows how many millions putting them in). The best part of those machines? Not the revealing pictures, not the radiation doses, but the fact that they flat-out didn't work; it was easy as pie to conceal a handgun or pack of explosives on one.
In a way, I am almost glad that I have a spinal cord stimulator in my body and have to get pat downs instead. Not that pat downs are fun, mind you, but they seem almost preferable to that.
I rather enjoy getting the pat-down. I've had lovely conversations with the TSA workers about weddings, shopping, spouses, travel plans, holiday celebrations, etc. No one has ever asked me why I prefer to avoid the scanner; perhaps they would do the same.
When I was a kid back in the 1960s & 1970s, flying was not like this. My grandparents would sometimes visit. When they landed, we would meet them as they got off the plane, and these were international flights. When they left, we would send them off at the gate. Sometimes us kids could even board the plane as they were seating, and say goodbye to them at their seats. People were advised to arrive a half hour before their flight time. No screenings were conducted of any kind, other than the most cursory customs check. On the rare occasion I flew anywhere, it was a thrilling treat.
Sure, I suppose a bit more security is warranted these days, but I think the vast majority of the current security theater is bullshit CYA that does little to actually make anyone safer. Between the TSA, and the airlines squeezing the seating down and charging extra for every little thing, traveling by air has become more and more unpleasant over the last 20 years.
This was a good read. Not anything that most people will be surprised at, but confirmation that it's as bad as we all think.
If we must waste a lot of money on substandard airport security couldn't we at least make it less irritating?
I actually tried to put a cat through the X-Ray once, but they made me carry it through the metal detector while the carrier went through the X-Ray machine.
I've not had the pleasure of the TSA pat-down, but I've wondered if one could creep out the agent by making subtle body and vocal indications of deep and perverse enjoyment.
Regarding the article: is anyone really surprised?
@6
You forgot to mention that passengers actually dressed like civilized people to fly. Mother always had her hair done and wore a skirt and high heels and father always wore a coat and tie whenever they flew. I remember mother putting me into a suit and tie to fly to Hawaii when I was 4 or 5. We had dinner in the upstairs dining room, in the “hump” of the 747, where we ate real food off of real china. After diner I visited the cockpit and “helped fly the plane.”
@9
I had one nearly bring me to completion two years ago in San Jose… Thought he was checking me for testicular cancer. He was cute. I didn’t complain.
Oh My Goodness, a low paid civil servant who stands around all day mocked me for being 20 pounds over weight while I flew on expense account. How ever will I survive?
@4 Airports are still using those stupid X-ray ones? I was hoping he'd say something about the efficacy of the mm scanners, maybe I'll have to dig through his blog.
Who could have predicted this? As fnarf (@2) says, "Fuck the TSA," -- but moreover fuck the chicken-shit politicians who created and continue to enable it.
Nudie scaners are still in Logan and RDU, as of Christmas when I was flying between them. And they still give sanctimonious speeches about how the radiation really isn't harmful (motherfucker we haven't tested it at all in a controlled setting you cannot accurately say that) when you opt out.
Fuck the TSA.
When I was a kid back in the 1960s & 1970s, flying was not like this. My grandparents would sometimes visit. When they landed, we would meet them as they got off the plane, and these were international flights. When they left, we would send them off at the gate. Sometimes us kids could even board the plane as they were seating, and say goodbye to them at their seats. People were advised to arrive a half hour before their flight time. No screenings were conducted of any kind, other than the most cursory customs check. On the rare occasion I flew anywhere, it was a thrilling treat.
Sure, I suppose a bit more security is warranted these days, but I think the vast majority of the current security theater is bullshit CYA that does little to actually make anyone safer. Between the TSA, and the airlines squeezing the seating down and charging extra for every little thing, traveling by air has become more and more unpleasant over the last 20 years.
If we must waste a lot of money on substandard airport security couldn't we at least make it less irritating?
I actually tried to put a cat through the X-Ray once, but they made me carry it through the metal detector while the carrier went through the X-Ray machine.
Regarding the article: is anyone really surprised?
You forgot to mention that passengers actually dressed like civilized people to fly. Mother always had her hair done and wore a skirt and high heels and father always wore a coat and tie whenever they flew. I remember mother putting me into a suit and tie to fly to Hawaii when I was 4 or 5. We had dinner in the upstairs dining room, in the “hump” of the 747, where we ate real food off of real china. After diner I visited the cockpit and “helped fly the plane.”
There used to be a real civility and elegance in travel.
http://www.everythingpanam.com/1970_-_19…
I had one nearly bring me to completion two years ago in San Jose… Thought he was checking me for testicular cancer. He was cute. I didn’t complain.