Apr 14 2009
Strip Search Machines
If you have been to a major airport in the past few years, you have probably seen one of the new whole body search machines that are currently being tested by the TSA. At our airport, I have never seen anybody actually going through the machine or being directed to go through it. I have never been through one at any airport and I would avoid it if given the choice between the new device and the traditional metal detector. I just don’t like the idea of a machine that strips people down to their naked bodies for the TSA to inspect. And that’s what the machine does. It gives the operator a view of the body and anything hard or metal you may have on or under your clothing.
Originally, I thought these new devices, proposed after the 9/11 attacks, were for those passengers selected for extra screening (random or because they are on a list) or those that just couldn’t make it through the metal detector without setting the thing off. Instead of “wanding” you with the hand-held metal detector, you would be directed to pass through the whole-body scanner. But, now it seems that the TSA is looking at the idea of sticking every passenger through one of the machines.
I think this is a bad idea for a couple of reasons. For me, it has nothing to do with somebody seeing me “naked.” That not it. I could care less if the guys at the gym see me in the buff or a TSA employee sees a representation of the same on a computer screen. But that’s me. I bet there are lots of folks of every age that would be truly uncomfortable with the idea. What if you had a child molester or similar deviant doing the screening? Just the thought makes my stomach turn. I’m not saying that the TSA doesn’t screen people, but how much does the TSA pay? I think you get the drift.
There is also something about the devices that just seems overly crude and clumsy. Clothing is a part of our western culture. I suspect the same is true for all developed peoples. It makes up a part of who we are, our individuality. And we don’t make people strip for trivial reasons. But here is this machine that strips young and old for no reason except our supposed inability to catch terrorists with more subtle and sophisticated means; more human means. Like I said, it is clumsy and crude. And I suspect that Americans will reject the strip search machines. Probably Europeans too.
