It’s a terrible thing to contemplate- a passenger jetliner being brought down by an act of terrorism. No one wants to contemplate dying in such a horrible and spectacular manner. Therefore, we should do anything and everything humanly possible to prevent an event like this from taking place. Right?
That statement is not something that a reasonable person would argue with, and yet it does raise some concerns. Must we surrender all civil liberties and personal dignity if we want to board an airplane?
Beginning Monday, more passengers at airport checkpoints in South Florida and around the nation will be subject to pat-down searches, and their carry-ons checked for traces of explosives, as the government tries to strengthen aviation security following the recent Russian airliner attacks.
Travelers also now will have to remove any jacket, blazer or suit coat — even athletic warm-up jackets — before going through the metal detectors. And screeners will have more latitude to refer passengers for additional inspections if they observe anything out of the ordinary in the way passengers’ clothes fit.
“Screeners will be able to further inspect passengers whose clothing may disguise their contour,” said Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman Lauren Stover.
“It gives us the ability to be able to ensure that passengers are not strapping explosives to their torsos and hiding them under loose, bulky clothing.”
If you take this trend to it’s silly but logical extreme, how long will it be before strip searches are required to board an airplane? After all, if the ultimate goal is to ensure that no one is carrying a weapon or an explosive on board, wouldn’t this be the ultimate way to ensure passenger safety?
Of course, the flip side of the question would be to ask how much of our civil liberties and personal dignity should we be willing to surrender simply to fly? Most Americans seem to fall into the “Whatever it takes to make us safe” school of thought, but should the effort to combat terrorism require us to give up everything that makes us who we are?
Speaking only for myself, I hate flying. It’s not that I’m afraid of anything; I simply detest the idea of some officious jackass going through my personal belongings in the name of “fighting terrorism”. In reality, 99.99999% of the flying public is a threat only to themselves. Yet we still willingly (well, that might be overstating it in my case) undergo virtually any assault upon our personal dignity in order to board a plane.
The sad reality is that, in the end, all of this “security” is accomplishing little except creating the illusion of safety among the flying public. The system is the equivalent of slamming shut the barn door after the horse has escaped. If our current airport security system were designed to slow, inconvenience, and degrade people it could be considered a brilliant success. If the idea is to protect us from the next threat, well…at least we FEEL safe, right?
