A TSA public service announcement

[goldkin]

Flying home to see my parents a few weeks back, I made sure to prepare for the possibility of TSA-related shenanigans. I'm a bit behind on reporting how that went here on journalspace, in part because I tweeted profusely about it and promptly forgot to mention it. I hope you don't mind; I really do love y'all.

On my trip back from Miami Ft. Lauderdale, I had the misfortune of flying through Terminal C instead of my usual B-route with Southwest. And 'lo and behold, their shiny new backscatter X-ray machines were fully operational.

Now, I'd already prepared for this eventuality, having checked the status of local airport scanners in advance* to ensure I knew when to prepare and where I'd need to opt out. Even at the extremely minuscule projected risk (16 fatalities per billion people, versus 8 per hundred million from air travel itself), I still prefer to keep my 'nards radiation free. Personal choice, really.

So, given the relatively low number of passengers in line (practically none) and relative emptiness of the terminal, I exercised my right to opt out of the scanner in favor of the "standard pat-down" that's been so becried in the media. At this point, I was given the option to move to a private area (and presumptively could have requested a witness, exactly as described here), but chose to have the search conducted in public given the slow foot traffic.

To my surprise, it wasn't nearly as bad as the media plays it up to be. The TSA personnel performing the search walked me through my full rights while performing the search, calling out every procedure and required guideline. And as I had identified myself as someone cognizant of the procedure, the official was happy to answer my questions, including offering a relative figure of the number of people who actually opt out in general (per capita, very few) and his reaction to National Opt-out Day.

It was also clear that the official was homosexual, which is actually the right psychological profile for the role -- given the likelyhood of being thorough and correct regarding procedure, without skipping or speeding through steps due to embarrassment. The person was genuinely friendly, easy to talk to, and walked through the entire procedure professionally without the groping or abject stupidity reported in the media.

Now, I personally disagree that these procedures are making us safer. When faced with the decision to choose one of two evils, choosing the lesser is still choosing one specific form of evil over another. And given my general background in security research, the level of security theater at our airports pains me, despite knowing exactly why it exists and how it's processed psychologically by the general public.

I did get one amusement out of the endeavor, though. At the tail end of the procedure, I tweeted the following from the airport:

> Not wanting to play backscatter cancer roulette, I opted for a security pat-down. It wasn't so terrible, despite being a lesser evil.

> Of course, I imagine this as TSA trying to pat down a dragon twice their size. Provide your own mental image here.

Well, klitaka called me on it:




And that makes the entire experience worthwhile.

--
* I'd like to point out that this link is freely available by searching Google, and is provided for informational purposes only. Please don't come after me for linking potential resources in some obscure, as-yet-to-be-defined elaborate plot. Thanks!

Comments

[tangyabominy]

It was also clear that the official was homosexual, which is actually the right psychological profile for the role -- given the likelyhood of being thorough and correct regarding procedure, without skipping or speeding through steps due to embarrassment.

I... am having a hard time seeing how the first part of that statement relates to the rest of it? Why would someone who was gay be more thorough and correct?

I love the art. :DD

[klitaka.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that was a bit baffling, and I had to read it a couple times. I think the meaning's something along the lines of, “Homosexual men do not feel as awkward or put-off by the anatomy of a human body as a straight man would," which I can certainly relate to — I become much less prudish after figuring out that aspect of my identity.

I'd guess the thoroughness might be an aspect of not being afraid of touching another person, and not being afraid of anatomy (everyone has it!), but if the TSA screeners do blanch at the thought of giving someone a pat-down, it might not be the right line of work.

[goldkin]

I... am having a hard time seeing how the first part of that statement relates to the rest of it? Why would someone who was gay be more thorough and correct?

Much of this is contextual, I think. I'd debated leaving the note out of the post entirely, but it had relevance that I wanted to keep in.

Florida (especially South Florida) is very much an anti-homosexual, anti-deviance* establishment. While California was passing Prop 8, we happily passed Prop 2 along similar grounds.

Given the stigma against sexual deviance and behavior that might even be considered deviant (remember, TSA officers are still human, even if it's their job to perform the checks), this struck me as surprisingly correct and proactive. But again, it's highly contextual. Given the clear psychological distinctions I'd like to draw between mandatory screening procedures in public and, say, a doctor's visit, perhaps I should better organize my thoughts on this point for future posts.
--
* It says a lot about my views that I'd prefer to rewrite this as "anti-correctness." But, so it goes. :)

[klitaka.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'd opt for the pat-down too. Not because I'm modest or worry about privacy — far from that, actually, though I used to be prudish about nudity. Anyway, my concerns about the backscatter machines come from the fact that the TSA and FDA's safety is all based on arbitrary data from the companies themselves.

The FDA response to the UCSF letter basically says, “the machines are below the threshold of an arbitrary dose limit we developed with the help of the manufacturers of these machines.” Some scientists don’t think that that is good enough.

The radiation they put out, from my understanding, penetrates the soft tissues of the body, not merely bouncing off the skin. It means it can be absorbed, cause DNA mutations, etc. I'm not paranoid about cancer, but I'd rather not take undue risk since at least one person in my immediate family has had cancer — especially not when the actual longterm risks of the machines haven't been tested or reviewed very extensively.

Also of interest is this video in which a German scientist fools a full-body scanner (which I reposted about 11 months before the whole TSA Backstatter Patdowngate and Opt-Out-Daygate).

I do agree with you that this is not the way to handle security. The TSA is all security theatre, protecting us from the threats of yesterday, today; protecting us from the threats of tomorrow by searching for failed terrorist plans of yesterday. All the people who have tried to terrorise air traffic since 2001 have been stopped, yet the TSA insists on checking for things similar these failed attempts. Anyway, it all seems a bit backwards to me, but at least it's finally making the majority of people take notice of what I think most people should have been thinking about back in 2006.


Anyway, I'm glad you got a kick out of the drawing! I drew it as a part of warming up yesterday before working on some projects for class. I do need to practise drawing more, though.

[goldkin]

Indeed! And thanks for posting that; you're more or less responsible for my writing an actual blog post on the experience.

[dragonzuela.livejournal.com]

That picture cracks me up! He's/you're like, "Guys, do you realize I'm already naked? And could have swallowed all sorts of weapons and explosives if I wanted to?"

[goldkin]

Doesn't it, though?

And that's exactly as I felt during screening, for lack of a better term. As I expressed my wings and tail, I half-expected them to be subjected to additional TSA scrutiny.

[dragonzuela.livejournal.com]

Now I'm imagining ghostly phantom limbs starting to pop up on the backscatter images.

"Crap guys, we turned the X-ray up too high. It's just supposed to see under the clothes, not under the flesh and into the soul."

[davv]

And given my general background in security research, the level of security theater at our airports pains me, despite knowing exactly why it exists and how it's processed psychologically by the general public.

Is the security theater employed to make people feel secure or out of the (mistaken) belief on TSA's end that it provides actual security?

[goldkin]

As Bruce Schneier would be apt to point out, security theat(er/re) focuses on maximizing perceived security. Framed thus, the TSA's job isn't to protect our ports from malicious intent; it's to offer a perceived social benefit that continues to keep it funded.

This inefficiency has a slight competitive element, however: airports can opt out of using TSA screeners after two years. They'll continue to be regulated by the TSA, though.