Posted on 02/20/2017 3:05:56 PM PST by WXRGina
It was an excellent week-long trip my husband Keith and I took to Arizona to take the 250 Pistol Class from Gunsite Academy. The week ended, and it was time for us to fly back home this past Saturday, February 18th. While I have gone through Transportation Security Administration (TSA) regional airport checkpoints since its spawning after 9-11, I had not yet gone through a TSA checkpoint at a major airport. Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport is a major airport, and on Saturday, I was immersed there in one of those TSA "horror stories" about which I had previously only read.
My very dim view of the TSA has been shaped by all the reports of corruption, misconduct, molestation and sexual assault, theft, abuse of power and ineptitude by the TSA. To find these stories, you need only do an Internet search with any of those terms along with "TSA." In addition to all that, air travelers in the United States are now stupidly forced to remove their shoes because of one Muslim maniac.
Needless to say, as we stood in the moderately long line of the Sky Harbor TSA security checkpoint, I was not happy and only wanted it to be over. We finally arrived at the x-ray conveyor belt with all the gray plastic bins into which we had to put our shoes, belts, purses, bags, watches, cell phones, laptops and anything in our pockets. When flying, I always try to wear nothing that would cause the x-ray imaging machines to raise an alert. So, I wore no belt or any jewelry. I had nothing in my pockets. I only carried my small purse, and I wore blue jeans, a long-sleeved cotton t-shirt and simple leather boots. I removed my boots and placed them and my purse into two of the bins and pushed them on toward the x-ray screener.
I was directed into the – what I call a "rape scan" – body imaging machine. As you may know, we are forced to stand inside it for several seconds with our arms held up as if we're common criminals, and the machine does a circular spin around our bodies. When the scan was done, a black woman told me to step out of the machine. I'm guessing this woman was probably in her early thirties. She directed my attention to the human body outline image on a screen outside the machine, which displayed the supposed results of my scan. There were "warning" boxes superimposed directly on the crotch, one knee and one ankle area, which I instantly knew were bogus.
Because of those flags, she informed me I would be subjected to an enhanced pat-down. I numbly looked at the entirely phony warning box images on the screen, knowing that with the advanced imaging capabilities of that machine, it would not possibly have "seen" any kind of threat anywhere on my body, much less between my legs. Nevertheless, I stood there silently with a smoldering outrage welling inside me as this girl described the sexual assault she was about to undertake on my body.
I hardly heard what she was saying she was about to do, because I was so angry knowing that this was a fake result, either from the machine or from someone's arbitrary decision to subject me to this despicable, Fourth Amendment-crushing, far-beyond-unreasonable search. She finished her little speech by asking me if I preferred [my sexual assault] to be done in a "private room" or right where we stood in front of hundreds of onlookers. I was barely able to mumble a "here" with an indication of my hand gesturing down to the yellow footprint stickers on the floor where I was to place my feet.
She required me to assist her in my sexual assault. I had to lift my shirt to give her clear access to my waistband, into which she thrust her blue-latex-gloved fingers and ran them all around the front and back of it. She made me hold my pants in place from the top as she crouched down and firmly ran her hands from the top of my legs to the bottom, both front, back and sides. She firmly pushed and rubbed her hands between my legs, the entire area – THE ENTIRE AREA – from the front and back.
She finally directed me to hold out my hands, palms up, as she swabbed them with damp squares of white tissue, which she inserted into a machine that I assume "sniffed" for explosive residue. When it gave my hands the all-clear, she indicated that I was free to go.
At that point, I was fairly blind with rage. Shakily, gritting my teeth hard enough to beat the band, I went and retrieved my boots and purse from the end of the screener belt several yards away, where they had remained while I got the enhanced grope-down. I was glad no one had taken my purse. Keith had been moved along after going through security, and from his viewpoint was unable to see my belongings or what was happening to me.
Still seeing red, I slowly walked to a chair near the TSA checkpoint to put on my boots. I was shaking with rage, and my husband had to quickly talk me down from reacting to the powerful anger that was exploding in my mind. The sickening feelings of rage, helplessness and violation continued to roil in me for the rest of the day.
What can I do? File a complaint with the TSA? Yeah, right. Call my congressman? And get a nice form letter reply in the mail in a month or so? Yeah, no. I'm powerless here, as are the many other people who have been sexually assaulted by the TSA. Maybe you'd like me to tone it down a notch and call it "molestation" or merely "groping," but I know what happened to me, and in any other situation, it would be legally regarded as sexual assault. If an ordinary person did to me what that woman – by authority of bad law – did to me, he would go to jail.
The TSA should be dismantled. Airport security needs to be returned to the airlines and local airports. The federal government's takeover of airport security screening after 9-11 has only created yet another unaccountable, monstrous bureaucracy that continues to grow in corruption, especially under Obama's recent lawless reign. Free-born American citizens should not have to abide such degenerate despotism in the name of "security." The TSA has seized illegitimate power in its random imposition of unreasonable searches on innocent airline passengers. If the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution means anything, then the TSA must go.
You miss my point.
You assumed that WXRGina has never been raped or sexually assaulted, outside of this incident. If so, she would be MUCH MORE sensitive to the pat downs.
I don’t want her to answer if she has or hasn’t, that’s not my business or my point.
My point is the assumption you had made that she never had, and your subsequent demand for an apology.... and those things are unacceptable.
I'm not sure, but I have a suspicion that if this were the case, it would have been part of the original story.
Stylish!
I love it.
:-) Good deal!
Good Lord what I’d give to be almost fifty again.
Youth is truly wasted on the young, isn’t it?
I'm not sure, but I have a suspicion that if this were the case, it would have been part of the original story.
No, it wouldn't be part of the original story, because, even though some may not realize it, this story is NOT about me only (and I'm not the whining type, despite some false assertions here). It's about the abusive, feckless TSA and countless thousands of other voiceless American air travelers who've been violated in the same way as I was.
Be sure. Not everyone wishes to speak of their past traumas, trying to relate them to present ones.
Speaking on the present one is enough.
It doesn't have to be. The problem is the young don't know how to take advantage of the opportunities afforded them.
In short, you made a false assumption and demanded an apology. By virtue of your false assumption, I feel you are the one who owes the apology.
Oh good Lord Laz, now YOU are sounding like a drama queen!
Apologize to this good woman for your impropriety or be known as a dishonorable old fool.
BTW, did anyone even ever look at the badge to ensure it wasn’t some photo ID from the pits of the local drag racing track, or check that it was actually your picture on the badge?
How about this for TSA’s new motto:
“TSA: We may work with airplanes.... but we’re not rocket scientists!”
Be well.
Oh, it got examined closely, but Federal ID is pretty sound stuff. Better made than drivers licenses, with more of the proofing materials than licenses have. Plus, since my Fed ID from the CDC was identical to Fed ID that TSA had, it immediately instilled a natural trust level. Of course, our respective orgs were mentioned — they knew I was CDC — but the neat part is, they knew at a mininum, I went through a NAIC security level check. (I actually made it to Public Trust, but they wouldn’t know that by looking at the badge). So that means they knew I was vetted much better than a typical license holder.
Clearly we have differing standards.
I choose not to fly commercial due to ample evidence of prior violations.
Again, until more refuse to fly, nothing will change and, sadly, your experience is pathetic evidence of the fact that even reading of such violations are insufficient to prompt action. Human nature may very well be this country’s downfall.
I’m not going to continue to beat a dead horse: You made a choice and despite knowledge that it could happen, you’re now outraged that it happened to you.
I challenge you to take your newfound outrage and do more than writing anonymously about a decision for which only you were responsible.
I did not write “anonymously” about this incident (which I also sent to the White House), and I am not “responsible” for being sexually assaulted by the TSA. The TSA is responsible for doing that. Just because I’ve read for years about the many abuses by the TSA doesn’t mean I, or ANY OTHER innocent airline passenger, “asked for this” simply for choosing to fly.
Many, many people have chosen not to fly because of the TSA, and this has already cost the airline industry a great deal in lost profits, but it’s not enough to cause the central government to rein in the TSA.
Because of people’s work schedule and other reasons, it’s not normally practical to drive the very long distance we flew. And that’s also a sign that we’ve lost our liberties—that our only option to avoid despotic sexual groping is to drive. B.S. on that!
I did not write “anonymously” (phones being what they are) but your reaction was expected. We at FR do not have the ability to edit posts.
I chose a job which would not require traveling. Our boy has chosen to isolate himself in another state; he can come here.
My choices are to reinforce and defend my remaining rights. I choose not to be assaulted or violated.
You made choices and obviously you do not have my sympathy for your reaction to an inevitable outcome given all the evidence. Commercial flight is not a “liberty” fyi; you could have chosen to charter a flight. THAT is a liberty.
Rather than waste your time here, take your righteous indignation to the next level. A “letter” is grossly-insufficient, if history is any guideline (16 years of this “BS” as you write).
Or don’t. Again, your choice.
I asked NO ONE for “sympathy.” That has NOTHING to do with why I wrote the report. I spoke for thousands of likewise abused passengers.
But, go ahead and blame the victim all you like. Again, if I, or anyone else, chooses to fly, it does not justify their abusive treatment of us.
Take it to the next level.
Defending your choice to fly here is a waste of time.
“Blame the victim,” as you write, is a very progressive thing to write.
Not taking the bait, hon.
Stop whining and defending your CHOICES; do something with your anger.
Progressive? That’s the last thing I am, and it’s a stupid thing to say since “blaming the victim” is what you were doing. I’m not whining, but since you clearly missed the meaning of the report, I don’t expect you to realize it.
THERE IS NOTHING I CAN DO TO REIN IN THE TSA.
Goodbye.
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