Cybrpnk's Rantings

I was recently asked by a conservative colleague to explain to him the ways in which my personal civil rights had been reduced since 9/11. Clearly there is still some health to our system, as I am allowed to write whatever I want on this blog, and have yet to be hauled off to a gulag. However I encountered a fine example of the growing American fascism this weekend in Albuquerque. As I approached security at the Skyport (the local quaint name for what the rest of us call an Airport), I was instructed to take off my shoes. Being a savvy traveller, I was wearing sneakers which I knew to be completely rubber. I informed the TSA person that my shoes would not set off the metal detector. She informed me that anyone who wore their shoes through the detector would be sent to secondary inspection. When I questioned this I was informed that it was a 'profile' issue and that anyone who wouldn't take off their shoes was supposed to be searched. Obviously this was a lie.

This poses a dilemma. If I challenge her, I get harassed, possibly stranded in Albuquerque, possibly arrested. My resistance would be described as 'interfering in the performance of the duty of a TSA officer.' I doubt that a judge in Albuquerque would be sympathetic. I could have asked for her badge number, and filed a complaint. I suspect that this would just lead to my getting hassled more in the future. And this is the problem with the current climate. The rule of law has become situational. Even though the TSA guidelines clearly indicate that passengers are not to be required to remove their shoes, some screeners are using a lack of submissive attitude as a rationale for secondary searches. Given recent reports indicating that airport security is no better at detecting weapons than it was pre-9/11 (and check out this from Fox News), it appears that the only function being served is to condition the public to accepting greater government control over our personal lives and belongings. This point is further illustrated by the fact that while the security screeners were making me take off my sneakers, they were completely missing the two glass bottles of root beer in my bag. Those would probably be better weapons than my keychain Swiss Army knife which I am no longer allowed to fly with. Had I purchased one of the wood and stone tomahawks I was eyeing in Santa Fe, they would have probably missed that too.

Were this an isolated glitch in our society, I would be happy to shrug it off as simple overzealousness on the part of a few government employees. Sadly this seems to be part of a pattern of outrageous behavior by government officials in the name of 'security.' Citizens are kept away from political events if they have dissenting views. People are physically hauled out of campaign events if they have the wrong t-shirt on. Legal aliens are forced to register with the INS. Law enforcement is given vastly expanded powers to fight terrorism, but they are allowed to use these powers however they choose. Our free and open society has been hijacked and distorted by grim-faced men and women declaring that they are just keeping us safe. While these same ghouls and hacks proclaim the power of freedom and liberty to transform other nations, they declare those same foundational rights as a threat here at home. Well-meaning people declare that all of these little infringements are okay as long as their children are kept safe. But they aren't okay. In fact they are downright un-American, and it is time that we started holding our so-called leaders to their responsibility to, above all, uphold our Constitution. The Founding Fathers did not lay down their lives for freedom just so that we could give in to a media-driven orgy of fear and surrender those same fears as meekly as lambs to the slaughter.