# TSA's Groin check? Going too far? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 16, 2010, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853 "2010-11-16T14:08:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2010, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/161 "2010-11-25T23:59:05Z")
The only scans I’ve seen barely look human, much less pornographic. Am I looking at the wrong scans? ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2010, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/162 "2010-11-26T02:03:21Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > Heh. If another dude touches my junk in the privacy of my own home, that’s a moral outrage against God and civilization. But if I don’t allow another dude to touch my junk at the airport, then I’m letting the terrorists win. > > So, I guess it’s okay if another dude touches my junk as long as I don’t ask him to? We are afraid of your American penis gun that takes down airplanes. ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2010, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/163 "2010-11-26T05:16:51Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > We are afraid of your American penis gun that takes down airplanes. Hmm. Maybe instead of “gay marriage” we can call it “Marriage with Enhanced Security Pat Downs.” Who could object to that? ---
**Author:** ![Susanann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2010, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/164 "2010-11-26T18:55:53Z")
> [@Waffle\_Decider](#): > > If the claim that the enhanced pat down includes groping inside the waistband is true, do they change their gloves after molesting each passenger? :eek: If you do not demand!!! that the TSA screener put on **fresh clean gloves** before touching you, then you absolutely deserve to get whatever disease, parasite, critter, filth, germ, microbe, etc that you get. (any nurse, in any hospital, who used the same gloves to handle different patients, would get fired) ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2010, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/165 "2010-11-27T03:44:43Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > I possess a TWIC, so I can legally access secure port areas simply by having the card read by a scanner. The catch is that despite my apparently being trusted by the government to enter all sorts of sensitive areas on display of the card, I must still stand in line to be treated as a potential terrorist with all the other mooks at the airport. If the government accepts that I am safe to, for example, drive a heavy, possibly bomb-laden vehicle into a port, then it seems to me that my being checked for underwear, or shoe, or deoderant bombs at the airport is, as I have always contended, a complete waste of time. > > Seems to me it’s this kind of uncoordinated and seemingly capricious application of procedures that has so many people talking dismissively of ‘security theater’. > > BTW, the TWIC program is administered by the TSA, so it’s not like they don’t know about it. I hear you completely. I had a TWIC at one time as well. I’ve also worked at nuclear facilities, and on a project for the government during the early days of the Iraq War where I had to go through a fuck lot more vetting than being checked to get on an airplane. And like you said, it’s not like the freaking government doesn’t know who we are. Yet I have to stand there in line along with everyone from Ma and Pa Kettle to the shifty-looking hoodie covered in gang tattoos, to be groped and have my “security” checked by someone who, ironically, I most likely greatly outrank from a “secure” standpoint. Until the airlines see a huge decrease in flyers, and flyers fess’ up and tell the airlines that they’re staying home due to TSA security, this will not only not get better, it’s likely to get worse. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2010, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/166 "2010-11-27T13:25:26Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > Until the airlines see a huge decrease in flyers, and flyers fess’ up and tell the airlines that they’re staying home due to TSA security, this will not only not get better, it’s likely to get worse. You think so? Why should it get better even then? Chase away all the customers, and the airlines will just take our tax money as another gov’ment bailout. Think how much easier it will be to run an airline without all those damn customers screwing up their day. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2010, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/167 "2010-11-27T15:27:31Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > You think so? Why should it get better even then? Chase away all the customers, and the airlines will just take our tax money as another gov’ment bailout. Think how much easier it will be to run an airline without all those damn customers screwing up their day. :rolleyes: Well, I hope that if the airlines had a customer revolt, as opposed to a convenient direct boogeyman of “Osama! Young Muslim males!” Anyone wearing shoes!", that they would lean on the TSA to stop fucking around. Under this Congress coming up, I’m not even sure that a “free American flags for war widows” bill would pass, let alone another bailout. ---
**Author:** ![smileybastard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@smileybastard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smileybastard)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2010, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/168 "2010-11-27T16:13:40Z")
> [@YamatoTwinkie](#): > > There’s a (soemewhat) valid reason for that fine. The typical scenario is a terrorist with an explosive device carefully hidden on his person who goes through the usual security check, and if he ends up getting flagged for a more intrusive scan/search, declines and walks away. There needs to be something preventing this from occuring, or else the same person could just keep trying to get on a different flight. Hmmm. let see I have the choice of being fined $10,000 or being caught with explosives (assuming they are right). That is just silly. The only people the $10,000 really hurts is innocent people. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2010, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/169 "2010-11-27T17:55:39Z")
Part of the equation is that people believe the TSA workers are highly trained professionals. They envision well trained professional police. That is not what they are. They are a cross section of America suddenly given more power than they have qualify for. They are trapped into a lose /lose situation. If a bomb blows, they did not do their job. If it does not, they are overstepping their abilities and taking our rights. If we have a real serious threat, tell the travelers. Don’t show up one day and decide squishing the nads of travelers will be acceptable. There are cases of old people who can barely walk being singled out for humiliating body checks. There was a 12 year old kid whose dad told him to take his shirt off ,because the kid was afraid to be hand checked.TSA singled him out and probably traumatized him. There are simply too many cases of TSA stupidity. ---
**Author:** ![Susanann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2010, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/170 "2010-11-28T02:38:22Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Part of the equation is that people believe the TSA workers are highly trained professionals. They envision well trained professional police. That is not what they are. \*\*They are a cross section of America \*\*suddenly given more power than they have qualify for. No!.. I really dont think so. They are no where close to being a “cross section of America”. Most of them were unemployed, or working part time at McDonalds before they got the TSA job. They are people who had no other jobs, or could not get any real jobs anywhere else. They are certainly no “better”, no are they any more “professional”, than burger flippers at McDonalds. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2010, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/171 "2010-11-28T11:14:04Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > Most of them were unemployed, or working part time at McDonalds before they got the TSA job. They are people who had no other jobs, or could not get any real jobs anywhere else. We cite our claims on the SDMB. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2010, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/172 "2010-11-28T15:05:48Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > We cite our claims on the SDMB. Someone doesn’t know who they’re talking to! I’d like to know exactly what kind of background screening a TSA gate guy gets. It seems to me the easiest way to get a bomb through a checkpoint would just be to stick it in a bag and make sure that the guy working the scanner is one of the bad guys. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2010, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/173 "2010-11-28T17:13:30Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Someone doesn’t know who they’re talking to! Can you explain that comment? It baffled me. > [@](#): > > I’d like to know exactly what kind of background screening a TSA gate guy gets. It seems to me the easiest way to get a bomb through a checkpoint would just be to stick it in a bag and make sure that the guy working the scanner is one of the bad guys. > > -Joe I don’t know all the details, but it does involve things like writing down a record of every non-US citizen you’ve ever had any contact with, as well as credit checks etc. How deeply your reports are investigated I couldn’t say. ---
**Author:** ![InterestedObserver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@InterestedObserver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InterestedObserver)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2010, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/174 "2010-11-28T20:38:54Z")
> [@wmfellows](#): > > Expensive, untried and generally pointlessly idiotic machines imposed due to pure cowardice and lack of a good rational mind applied to the issue… > > . I suspect there is a much simpler explanation: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/31/AR2009123101746.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/31/AR2009123101746.html) Michael Chertoff: “During my time as secretary of homeland security, the Transportation Security Administration began working to replace the 1970s-era metal detectors used at airports across America with modern technology able to detect non-metal weapons concealed by terrorists on their bodies – even in their underwear, where Abdulmutallab allegedly hid his bomb. The latest versions of these machines – sometimes called whole-body imagers – are deployed at 19 airports, and the TSA is attempting to place them throughout the nation.” > **[Chertoff Joins Defense Firm that Defrauded U.S.](http://www.allgov.com/news/controversies/chertoff-joins-defense-firm-that-defrauded-us?news=840572)** > > Michael Chertoff, the former homeland security chief who’s not been shy about exploiting terrorist threats for the benefit of his clients, has decided to join a top defense contractor that defrauded the U.S. government. >   > The one-time head of... "Michael Chertoff, the former homeland security chief who’s not been shy about exploiting terrorist threats for the benefit of his clients, has decided to join a top defense contractor that defrauded the U.S. government. The one-time head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) under President George W. Bush is now a board member of BAE Systems, the United Kingdom-based defense corporation that agreed to pay $447 million in fines to the American and British governments to settle allegations of corruption, including bribing a top Saudi Arabian official. BAE is the eighth-largest contractor doing business with Washington, having received $7.1 billion in government contracts in 2009 alone. It also has received more than $200 million from DHS since 2005. Following the attempted bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight on Christmas Day, Chertoff was seen on television calling for the government to buy full-body scanners for airport checkpoints. Chertoff failed to mention in numerous interviews that his consulting business represented the company, Rapiscan Systems, that makes the scanners." [http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2010/01/02/group\_slams\_chertoff\_on\_scanner\_promotion/](http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2010/01/02/group_slams_chertoff_on_scanner_promotion/) “Since the attempted bombing of a US airliner on Christmas Day, former Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff has given dozens of media interviews touting the need for the federal government to buy more full-body scanners for airports. What he has made little mention of is that the Chertoff Group, his security consulting agency, includes a client that manufactures the machines. Chertoff disclosed the relationship on a CNN program Wednesday, in response to a question…Chertoff’s advocacy for the technology dates to his time in the Bush administration. In 2005, Homeland Security ordered the government’s first batch of the scanners - five from California-based Rapiscan Systems. Rapiscan is one of only two companies that make full-body scanners in accordance with current contract specifications required by the federal government…In the summer, TSA purchased 150 more machines from Rapiscan with $25 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds. Rapiscan was the only company that qualified for the contract because it had developed technology that performs the screening using a less-graphic body imaging system, which is also less controversial. (Since then, another company, L-3 Communications, has qualified for future contracts, but no new contracts have been awarded.)” This man and many others like him are businessmen who know how to get billions in taxpayer money for their own (and their clients’) enrichment. They pass in and out of the revolving door of government “service”, but they are lobbyists and corporate shills first and foremost. Like those who’ve seen to it that certain companies they “used to” be associated with win no-bid contracts, or serve as Drug Czar and go on to make millions in the drug testing industry, or are elected to Congress and later form a medical supply and services company which defrauds Medicare of billions, or just happen to be a cousin of the President who creates No Child Left Behind and just happen to have a standardized testing and scoring company which profits hugely from the new policies. :dubious: Eh, then again, I’m sure it’s all a coincidence and I’m just a conspiracy theorist. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Norse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a9adbd/32.png) [@Norse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Norse)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2010, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853/175 "2010-11-30T18:55:52Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > Over on Andrew Sullivan’s site, someone is encouraging men to ask for a pat down while dressed in a kilt. Of course a man wears nothing under the kilt. [Here](http://subliminalpanda.blogspot.com/2010/11/tsa-fondling-fat-mens-balls-since-2010.html)’s a guy who claims to actually have done it. > [@](#): > > The agent rolled his eyes before I could finish telling him that I was opting out of the AIT. He put the microphone of his radio to his mouth and muttered into it. Meanwhile, something in my rollerboard had the attention of the guy at the scanner. Like I said, American’s go big or go home. I not only had a dream date with a patter-downer, but I got to have a luggage inspection with one of an online security school’s finest. > > […] > > With blue latex gloves on, the backside of Gill’s hand caressed my ankles and calf. The hand moved up my knee and vanished along my inner thigh, under the kilt… > > Buddafingahs! > > Had I a light bulb for a nose, it would have glowed. I almost thought about even making a buzzing noise, but since I had the attention of several TSA officers, plus the one waiting to rifle my rollerboard, I stifled my smirk. I’d officially been felt up by Uncle Sam. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tsas-groin-check-going-too-far/560853.md?page=8)