Naked Scanner - What Price Freedom?

Written by Muhammad Tahir

It was touted as a major campaign to disrupt air travel on the busiest airport day of the year. The spin and counter spin means that the dust has yet to settle.  Planned as a mass act of resistance against the introduction of naked scanners across the country, National Opt Out Day was planned as a way to paralyze security checks on the busiest air travel day in the US by choosing pat-downs instead of the naked scanner. In reality, there appear to have been no disruptions.

Officials have taken this as proof that people in fact do not object to naked scanners (despite a poll which shows that 61% of Americans oppose both full body scans AND enhanced pat-downs), although there is evidence that in a shrewd move to blunt the Opt Out Day protests, scanner use was deliberately curtailed on the day.

The key however remains people's relative perception of imminent threat balanced against the cost and inconvenience involved with the choice. What appears to be true from all available data is that the vast amount of "terrorist activity" which is detected is actually the result of entrapment by domestic security forces - this week's apprehension of a Seattle teen for attempting to blow up a Christmas Tree lighting ceremony is a case in point. In a "long-term" sting operation, the FBI lured Mohamed Osman Mohamud, 19 into the plot, meeting with him several times and even providing him with the phony bomb he attempted to detonate by cell phone.

So let me get this straight, the FBI find this Jihadi wanna-be trolling the internet, string him along, encourage him, provide him with a fake bomb, presumably show him how to use it, and then arrest him in a blaze of law-enforcing glory. I feel so unsafe...I'm sure I'll feel better after my naked scan...

From Pearl Harbour to the Gulf of Tonkin to 9/11, the US has repeatedly used the apparent provocation of others to justify military adventures while softening up public opposition to the same, whether it was World War II, the Vietnam War, or the invasion of Iraq. In every case, it has subsequently become clear there was either prior knowledge of the event, or the apparent link to stated war objectives was imaginary (can you say "hidden weapons of mass destruction" fast five times?).

On the other hand, if people can't be convinced that an imminent threat exists, perhaps they can be coerced into acquiescing based on the inconvenience of possible alternatives. Don't want to opt for the potentially cancer-inducing naked scan? Then please step aside to be sexually molested.

Where is all this leading? Suffice to say that becoming habituated to a litany of small intrusions and humiliations will make it much easier to swallow when all our civil rights are taken away from us in order to ensure "homeland security", or even more disturbingly to preserve "social order". As the economic climate continues to deteriorate, expect to see less concern over the infringement of the rights of others, especially when the choice is between MY convenience and economic well-being over YOUR right to be different. The irony is of course that the dynamism and diversity that have so greatly contributed to economic prosperity in the West will be sacrificed to shore up a progressively deteriorating status quo.