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‘Don’t grope me’: The roots of the TSA groping backlash explained

9:16 AM 11/17/2010
Mike Riggs

On Oct. 29, a Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agent was going about his business when a middle-aged Jewish man in spectacles walked through his checkpoint at Baltimore-Washington International airport. Unlike most passengers, the Atlantic’s Jeff Goldberg wasn’t in a hurry. In fact, he was a little hard to get rid of. He wanted to talk to the TSA agent and his colleagues about the new x-ray machines they were using to screen passengers, as well as the alternative: A physical search that requires agents to grope passengers’ thighs until they meet resistance.

After submitting to the pat-down, Goldberg walked to his gate, broke out his laptop, and published a blog post outlining the TSA’s newest screening procedure.

“For the First Time, the TSA Meets Resistance” was the first sloughing sheet of snow in what would soon be an avalanche.

Two weeks later, California resident John Tyner refused to surrender his civil liberties in exchange for boarding a plane at San Diego International Airport. “If you touch my junk,” Tyner told a TSA agent who was preparing to pat him down, “I will have you arrested.”

Like Goldberg’s post, Tyner’s video of his altercation with San Diego TSA agents quickly went viral. In the days since, anecdotes about nasty run-ins with over-zealous and poorly trained TSA agents have popped up everywhere.

Pulitzer-winning humorist Dave Barry appeared on NPR to explain his own groping experience. When the former Miami Herald’s columnist’s groin didn’t show up clearly in the x-ray image, a TSA agent pulled him aside for additional screening.

“Well, they take you in this little room. And it’s an unpleasant little room. The man is putting on the blue gloves. He’s telling me how he’s going to touch me. And he makes a big point about when he’s going to be using the front of his hand and when he’s going to be using the back of his hand,” Barry told NPR’s Melissa Block.

“And then while I was in there the other guy with the boarding pass came in. And he says, oh, you’re Dave Barry. I’m a big fan. And so I had this kind of surreal conversation with one guy telling me what a big fan he is … and the other guy is groping me.”

Television stations and newspapers have responded to the outpouring of anecdotes by asking questions they could’ve — and should’ve — asked at any point over the last nine years; about the effectiveness of the TSA’s screening procedures, about the rights of passengers, about the best use of resources in the War on Terror.

“It’s about time,” said world-renowned security technologist Bruce Schneier. “I was wondering when this would happen; when people would say, ‘Enough. This is just plain stupid.’”

Goldberg concurs. “Why did I write the thing that I wrote two weeks ago? Because I was told that the checkpoint pat-down procedures were going to be intensified. I don’t know why other people picked it up. I think it might be one of these ‘enough already’ moments.”

Tags: Air safety, Aviation, CBS, CBS Corporation, Counter-terrorism, Department of Homeland Security, Federal Air Marshal Service, Gillette, John Mica, Miami Herald, Miami Herald Publishing Co, National security, Orlando, San Diego, The Gillette Company, Transportation in the United States, Transportation Security Administration
  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Robert-Feeley/729686093 Robert Feeley

    The launch of TSA’s Program to Examine Random Voyagers (PERV) has attracted some pretty slimy charachters to work airport security – SHOCKING details at:

    http://spnheadlines.blogspot.com/2010/03/faa-tiger-will-work-airport-security_19.html

    Peace! :-)

  • Cardiacarrestwarrent

    Profiling that subjects middle-eastern looking men (and women, and south-asian men, and women) to significant scrutiny would actually be a very good start.The likelyhood of blue eyed, white haired WASP grannies, harried businessmen and businesswomen with Blackberries and laptops, or scantily clad blond bimbos in espadrilles trying to disrupt a flight for the Islamic cause is negligible.

  • Pingback: Tweets that mention ‘Don’t grope me’: The roots of the TSA groping backlash explained | The Daily Caller - Breaking News, Opinion, Research, and Entertainment -- Topsy.com

  • EWRoss

    The citizens’ revolt over full-body scans and intrusive pat-downs is growing quickly. The American people understand the need for airport security, but they don’t understand why they should be subjected to these degrading and humiliating procedures that invade their privacy. Like all revolts, however, if it is to be successful at changing the U.S. government’s policies on airport security; it needs to put forth an alternative strategy that people can rally around. That alterative is “focus on the terrorist, not the bomb.” That’s what the Israelis do and that’s what the Brits did with the Irish Republican Army when it wanted to hijack and blow up their airplanes.

    Focus on the terrorist, not the bomb means that TSA and private companies, at those airports where they still operate, must be able to use reasonable profiling techniques. Profiling doesn’t mean just subjecting Middle Eastern males to intrusive screening, it means using a variety of techniques and criteria for identifying terrorists. These proven techniques are well understood by law enforcement and intelligence agencies but we don’t use them the way we should for airport screening because of political correctness.

    The time has come for Americans to decide if they are willing to give up their freedom and dignity for political correctness or if they are going to demand that their government use common sense and do what works. If we don’t stop this madness now, what’s the next step? Will TSA screeners take us into private rooms, tell us to take our clothes off, and probe our body cavities with rubber-gloved hands? Are we willing to continue down the slippery slope toward becoming a police state just to avoid law suits and confrontation with political correctness advocates? Does the U.S. Constitution protect us from warrantless searches and seizures, unless you buy an airline ticket? This is a question we should be anxious for the U.S. Supreme Court to decide.

    Focus on the terrorist, not the bomb applies to passenger screening. It doesn’t apply to cargo screening where security procedures are woefully lacking. Most cargo that enters the U.S. in commercial passenger aircraft is not screened. Al-Qaeda has already shifted its focus away from suicide-bombers that attempt to board commercial aircraft to cargo bombs. We need to stop “fighting the last war” and begin fighting the current one efficiently and effectively.

    What can you do? Write your Senator and Representative. Tell them you want Congress to act to force the TSA to stop what doesn’t work and do what does.

    http://www.ewross.com/tsa_screeners_have_their_hands_full.htm

    • windrdr

      This. I’m not very impressed by the 81% in favor results obtained by CBS news, as it’s likely the question was framed in such a manner that anyone not giving it much thought would respond that ‘security’ is needed.

      The government is giving us a false choice (actually no choice) in the matter – either their unimaginative, one size fits no one solution, or bupkiss.

      The only way this will change is if the outrage from the American public completely overwhelms the minor squawking from paid professional complainers such as CAIR. Only when the political calculus indicates that the politicians risk much more by being “PC” than by throwing the BS flag on the absolute idiocy we’ve slouched our way into will the situation change.

      It may not have happened in a manner that was envisioned, nor at a pace that was preferred, but the growing disruptions to our liberty, the inconveniences, and the internal divisions are exactly what those using terror were hoping for. This is not to say they have won, or are winning, but they’re certainly putting points on the board with our ‘own goal’ behavior.

      • didacticrogue

        I’m more likely to believe – though not understand – the 81% number when I see news coverage like this. The CNN news readers editorialize on the story after their edited video (a flawed redaction, IMO), seemingly dismissing Tyner’s “pain” as understandable, but a necessary element of life in the modern world.

        The unedited videos – here, here, and here – while excruciatingly boring (at 25 minutes), much more accurately illustrate Tyner’s experience.

        Can you get the average person to sit through 25 minutes of unedited video in order to experience the full story for themselves? Clearly not. Could you edit the video without redacting the gist of Tyner’s interaction with the TSA? Obviously you could. CNN simply chose not to.