Sitting in the Harley Davidson Museum listening to The Who’s Tommy, I listened to Wicked Uncle Ernie sing of “fiddling about.” My son said that was sick. Indeed it was. And is. Back then, we knew it.
When the Underpants bomber gave it his best shot, it was obvious that we were only a few steps away from body cavity searches. While we play out the pretense of nudie images and Uncle TSA Agent Ernie touching, we know that security theater has yet to reach its fullest potential. It’s a given that someone will put a stick of something up his butt, not because they believe it will take down a plane but because of the havoc it will cause on traveling Americans.
There’s no shortage of discussion around, so I won’t add unnecessarily to the clutter. One interesting perspective was offered by marketing guru Seth Godin.
The heart of the matter comes from the fact that the TSA often doesn’t understand that it is in show business, not security business. A rational look at the threats facing travelers would indicate that intense scrutiny of a four ounce jar of mouthwash or aggressive frisking of a child is a misplaced use of resources. If the goal is to find dangerous items in cargo or track down Stinger missiles, this isn’t going to help.
He offers them an alternative.
Smart marketers know how to pivot. I think it’s time to do that. Start marketing the idea that flying is safe, like driving, but it’s not perfect, like driving. If someone is crazy enough to hurt themselves or spend their life in jail, we’re not going to stop them, and even if we did, they’d just cause havoc somewhere else. So instead of spending billions of dollars a year in time and money pretending, let’s just get back to work.
The current model doesn’t scale.
Given the options of cavity searches or relative risk, the latter always seemed the better choice. Until then, we’re left to enjoy the show.
I never liked Chuck Berry’s My Ding-A-Ling song. It reflected childish titillation at the time, because it was so risque. I like it even less now, and it’s still childish. Bad music. Bad policy. If they’re going to put on a show, they really ought to consider The Who.
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Horse is out of the barn. In Sept. 2009, an Al-Qaeda dude ‘surrendered’ himself to the Saudi Deputy Minister of Interior, Mohammed bin Nayef, and a little package concealed in his rectum exploded. Questions remain about whether he exploded it or it was exploded by remote control. In any event, ‘bombs in bums’ is now a fact and a security concern.
According to some media reports, ‘bombs in boobs’ is here, too. Replacing silicone breast implants with C4 or RDX is not beyond imagination.
Back in the ’80s, my then-pregnant wife would have her belly patted down to make sure she was truly pregnant, not carrying a ‘belly-bomb’. Of course, the belly bombs they were concerned about were not of the White Tavern or White Castle variety
But instituting cavity searches would only be stepping up security to Israeli levels–as we’re told so often we should be doing. Wise security, don’t you know. Israeli security does and will insist on cavity searches if they think it necessary, though apparently not on a random basis, thus distinguishing it from TSA protocols.
The solutions to avoiding scans and pat-downs are easy: 1) stop flying or 2) strip all passengers naked, gas them into unconsciousness, stack on racks in the airplane, then revive and reclothe upon landing. I think the airlines might like the latter better.
The rectum has a long and storied history of concealing contraband. But you may not have exhausted all the potential reactions.