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Is screening about security or obsession with sex?
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Disclaimer:
Elaine Kolodziej is responsible for this content, which is not edited by the Wilson County News or wilsoncountynews.com. |
November 23, 2010 | 872 views | 3 comments
Are Americans hopelessly obsessed with sex?
Let me rephrase that. Americans are hopelessly obsessed with sex.
With all the hoopla surrounding the new invasive airport screening techniques, could it be that Americans are missing the mark on this one? The focus is more on the “naked” aspect than on the security aspect.
The extra screening is supposed to be all about security. Whether or not the nude body scans will make us secure is beside the point of this little tirade. The media have quite willingly joined the fray about the naked full-body scans and the alternative -- full-body frisking including groping, gawking, and other invasive searches of body cavities and private parts.
The emphasis in the media is all about the sensational aspects of the searches. There is less emphasis on the constitutionality of treating law-abiding citizens like criminals while ignoring the obvious. For instance, what if they were to question, grill, and probe all passengers from foreign terror-sponsoring countries? And all passengers who purchase a one-way ticket -- with cash? Ask them where they are going to stay and for how long?
No. This would be an invasion of privacy and possibly even -- horrors -- racial profiling. There’s certainly more than one concern about this issue. U.S. Rep. Ron Paul has filed legislation to rein in the offensive airport searches by the federal Transportation Security Administration.
His legislation would establish that the security screeners who grope travelers and gawk at their nude pictures be subject to the same laws as anyone else. “My legislation is simple,” Paul said in a statement available at his website. “It establishes that airport security screeners are not immune from any US law regarding physical contact with another person, making images of another person, or causing physical harm through the use of radiation-emitting machinery on another person. It means they are subject to the same laws as the rest of us.”
As far as the nude images, they might not be the main concern. You’ll never see those people again, and they don’t know who you are. But the question is, whether or not all the strip searches, whether virtual or physical, improve our security.
As Paul pointed out, putting locks on the cockpit doors and a gun in the hands of pilots has helped probably more than any other measure recently instituted.
Part of the problem with current thinking is that Americans have come to accept the nanny-state, expecting and even demanding to be taken care of by the government. In exchange for this care, they are ready to sacrifice their liberties.
This is wrong thinking, again going back to the Constitution. The government is supposed to protect our liberty, not suppress it in the name of security.
We willingly take off our shoes and submit ourselves to humiliating and inconvenient searches and scans. We are relying on machines and technology instead of human beings and good old common sense to determine which people are most likely to be a threat to Americans’ safety.
It is a fact that American Homeland Security has yet to discover and avert a real terrorist disaster without the input from human beings. Every time one of these near-disasters has been averted, it has been a relative or someone who turns them in -- and often-times their warnings are ignored, such as with the 9-11 terrorist attacks.
For goodness sake, America. Let’s focus on the real issues: Security and Constitutionality. |
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retiredinlavernia
lavernia
November 30, 2010 6:27am
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Rock'n chair Rambler
Over Taxed, TX
November 28, 2010 9:12am
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Senior Citizen
Wilson County
November 27, 2010 10:13pm
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