Selected for Special Attention! (airport security rant)

The BBQ Pit
1

I got on a place yesterday, and discovered to my dismay that I had the dreaded Secret Code on my boarding pass that informed the TSA knuckledraggers that I had been “Selected for Special Attention.”

In addition to causing me further annoyance, the weird part was that each TSA person I would come into contact with would repeat that phrase, without smiling, yet in a tone of voice that indicated I had just won something nice.

“You’ve been selected for special attention, sir. Please step over here.”

“Good afternoon, you’ve been selected for special attention. Please place all your belongings on the conveyor including your belt and shoes and step over to the metal detector”.

“Hello, you’ve been selected for special attention today, sir, so please face this way and raise your arms while I pat you down. Ok, now please step over to the luggage claim area.”

“Hello, you’ve been selected for special attention, so we are going to have to hand-search all of your belongings.”

Christ people. Just come out and say:

“You’ve been randomly selected for an inconvenience today, sir. By the way, your gel deodorant has to be less than 3.4 ounces and in a plastic bag because of some imagined and totally unrealistic threat dreamed up by a white house staffer who read too many Tom Clancy novels. However, inexplicably, even though you are in violation of the size restrictions, I will give you a plastic baggie to put your deodorant in and let you take it on the plane anyway as though this farce actually has some purpose and meaning.”

“Sir, I’m going to pat you down. Not with the intention of actually finding anything, since because we are afraid of lawsuits I will not touch any area between your middle abdomen and mid thighs, and we all know you could hide damn near anything you wanted there.”

“Sir, please take your laptop out of the case so I can peer at it intently like I actually know how to use one of these things. I’m not going to ask you to turn it on or do anything to verify its functionality. Instead I will poke inquiringly at the keyboard as if that will reveal to me whether or not this is a bomb.”

“Sir, I’m now going to swipe one of these fabric discs over some of your belonging and insert them into this Magic Machine I do not understand the workings of. Even though this only detects nitrate-based explosives, I have complete confidence that this device will ensure the safety of all passengers.”

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to throw away that keychain because it looks like a realistic replica of a bullet. I know that you happen to be rather fond of this keychain, but I am convinced that a fake bullet could somehow be used in an indeterminate manner to hijack an airplane, or bring it down from the very sky.”

“Sir, on behalf of the Transportation Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security I would like to thank you for participating in our little play-acting session today. I realize that not a damn thing we did today would prevent any terrorist with an IQ higher than 75 from brining your plane down on this fine afternoon, but we like to put up a good show.”

2

My wife gets selected for special attention at an alarming rate. We have no idea why except she is petite and well-dressed but half Italian and maybe they confuse that with being Jewish which in turn they mistake for Arab fundamentalists. Anyway she gets a sad look every time she gets selected and I get pissed because I am the evil one who dreams up creative ways to thrwart all kinds of security but mostly because I have to wait too. We were headed to France with our two year old daughter when she got selected for the special treatment at Boston Logan. My daughter and stood there waiting and waiting in the holding area for family of terrorists. Right before she was done, I set my daughter down who then ran into the secure area and said “Mommy, mommy!” and hugged her legs. Ugh oh, my two year old may have just secretly passed a bomb to her mother so they explained. The physical screening had to start over to sort out what may have just gone down…

3

The last time I flew I got picked because my driver’s licence was expired. Apparently having expired ID makes you a terrorist. I would have been pissed, except that I got through security in about five minutes going out and about ten coming home, as opposed to waiting in line for God only knows how long.

And yes, I think it’s all bullshit.

4

Kudos on your starring role in airport security theater.
I hope you hung around for an encore or two.

(My trip involving my family of 5 and one black powder musket is less than 2 weeks off. I guess it is about time I started measuring toiletries! Seriously, I plan on checking everything through, but I always expect the worst.)

5

In Hawaii my whole family was selected for special attention because “there are five of you and you checked five bags.” Uh… that’s unusual? Was I supposed to pack three hat boxes and my skis? What?

And we were all, “WTF?” to each other in the Security Area and got a very stern talking to that we were not allowed to talk. And put our feet precisely within the outlines, please.

I’ve gone through security twice with my 91 year old grandmother, who is quite sharp but can’t hear worth a damn. The one time they were so nice (since she uses a walker or a wheelchair they have to scan her manually) and the other time they were such assholes. They were getting really brusque and impatient with her, and I kept trying to tell them that she just couldn’t hear their instructions, but obviously I wasn’t welcome at the harass-the-old-lady party. They didn’t act like they could hear me any more than she could hear them!

6

Shoot, I’d rather have what they did to me in Hong Kong- they didn’t speak English very well and there was some kind of submachine gun pointed at me the whole time, but it was quick, thorough, and honest (and by honest I mean there was no random selection bullshit- I was a seventeen-year-old male flying alone, so of course they were going to search me). Maybe we should outsource.

7

I almost forgot the most idiotic part of the whole system.

After all the drama and show at the terminal, if you happen to be taking a flight with dinner service

Sure, it’s only a plastic knife. Do me a favor and watch one of those MSNBC weekend “lockdown” specials where they talk about weapons made by prisoners. Shit, given some plastic cutlery, a toilet paper roll from the lavatory and the time on a 15-hour flight, one of those guys could probably build a tactical nuclear weapon. Or at least a broadsword.

I sure hope MacGyver is on the no-fly list.

8

You should see how excited they got last time I flew. Apparently I stepped in some dog shit on my way to the airport, so it all lit up as EXPLOSIVE.

9

I have nothing to add except the OP is the best thing I’ve read in a while. Thanks!

10

The one overriding thing I see coming from the OP, which I fully agree with: TSA employees are thoroughly incompetent. Not saying that airport security staff elsewhere are better, but they do a good job at appearing so (and hey, it’s all about making people feel secure, anyway?). A few weeks ago I was particularly amused, flying out of a small local airport, to be told by the x-ray machine operator to not bother taking my laptop out to be screened separately, “because if I couldn’t tell whether there was a computer in there, I shouldn’t be here”.

11

Last year when my MIL took my son to England for a month, they were both selected for “special attention.”

We think it’s because my son was wearing his cowboy boots.

12

But as you’re singled out for special attention, just think of all the hassle that those who run plants where hazardous, toxic chemicals are manufactured or used must endure to make sure that the terrorists don’t turn their chemicals into weapons of mass murder.

Oh, wait.

13

I work at a plant where hazardous, toxic chemicals are manufactured and used.

I have to endure hassles so that the terrorists don’t turn these chemicals into weapons of mass murder. These hassles are just as dumb, if not dumber than the oddities the TSA comes up with.

14

Those of us rich and/or stupid enough to fly in First Class (in the front of the plane next to the cockpit) get real metal knives :smack: :dubious:

15

I got a knee replacement a few months ago. Now every single time I ever go through security anywhere ever again I will have to undergo full searching. Even though I carry a card stating I have a knee replacement, with all the pertinent info about me and my doctor and the whole nine yards. I’ve already flown once, and having to allow an extra 15-30 minutes for them to figure out that, duh hey, that really is an artificial knee. Saying it is a major, serious pain in the ass is an understatement. And I only have this to look for at every airport in the entire world for the rest of my life. Lucky me. :rolleyes:

16

I have nothing to add, except that every flight I am on, they have asked me–either at booking (online) or at checkin–if I am military. In eight years, I have yet to get a seat at the middle of the plane. I am always either in the first row behind first class or in the next to last row near the engines.

It’s as if they expect me to storm the plane should something happen. . . I dig, I understand, I’m gonna make it incumbent on myself to kick ass if the plane gets hijacked, but don’t make me have a damn conspiracy theory about it!

Tripler
I step offa my soapbox now.

17

A couple of years ago, both my son and I got selected for SA when flying between Hawaii and Oahu.

Nobody else. Just us.

Sure. One 52 year old and his 14 year old son…they’re the terrorists. :rolleyes:

We’re flying again in a couple of weeks, and I’ll be carrying a CPAP machine on-board.

SA, round two, comin’ up.

18

The fact they made you throw away your key chain really sucks. The rest of it is just an inconvenience, but the loss of the key chain is permanent.

19

For God’s sake don’t store your luggage in the garage. The fumes from all manner of things you have stored there (gas, pesticides, fertilizer, etc, etc…) will be detectible with the little wipe thingys. I had that happen on a trip. after only a few days for the return trip, the trace amounts were below the threshold. However, having them search my luggage and think about taking apart my CPAP machine was so much fun.

I now store my suitcase in a closet.

20

Does your knee replacement make the security alarm go off? Man, I’m so jealous! The one thing I was looking forward to when I broke my leg (it has two bolts in the ankle bone and a 6 or so inch plate on the fibula [or is it tibia?, the small one on the outside of the leg]), was that I’d be able to set off the alarms. I kindof looked at it like entertainment and revenge all wrapped in one. Entertainment due to watching them freak out at the alarms actually going off, and revenge because they then have to do the whole “wanding” trying to figure out where the metal is located thing. It’s never happened, not even when they wand me.

Sigh…

My barettes set off the wand, but not the metal plate in my leg. Weird…:smiley: