If the scanners/pat-downs were actually capable of preventing a terrorist attack then we'd be having a very different discussion about this. Right-wingers in favor of the new screening procedures try to frame it that way, that we're irresponsibly favoring some abstract concept of "rights" over public safety. But we're not. Because the new screenings do not increase public safety, and the TSA is well aware of this. For example, they want to make pilots go through the scanners/pat-downs, which is ridiculous because if a pilot wanted to destroy a plane, they wouldn't have to bring anything on board, they'd just crash it. And there is lax screening of job applicants for baggage handlers, plane mechanics and TSA employees themselves. This is not about making us safer and the TSA knows it. This is all about appearances.
So we opponents of the new screenings are not coming down on the side of our own comfort at the expense of public safety. We're opposed to the government abusing its authority, and potentially harming people, for the sake of looking like they're doing something.
This Huffington Post article about how the TSA works is illuminating and confirms some things I suspected: the TSA is in the difficult position of being responsible for preventing events that are inherently unpredictable. If someone gets by their security methods and blows up or crashes a plane - and there is no way to guarantee 100% that that can't happen - then the TSA will be the first to get blamed. This is an unfortunate reality. It would be nice if we could all collectively agree not to blame them for failing to do the impossible but this is America and whenever something goes wrong, the first thing we do is find a scapegoat (apart from the person who actually blew up the plane, whom we're not all that interested in for some reason, but that's a whole other blog post).
They respond to this difficult situation by, as the HuffPost article describes, operating in a perpetual state of crisis. That is not an effective way to run any organization. They desperately grasp for anything they think might help, without any justification for that method and often only after someone was caught by older methods that were already in place: the shoe bomber and people planning to bring liquid explosives onto planes for example. These people were prevented from getting explosives onto a plane BEFORE we had to take off our shoes and not bring liquids but these procedures are now required to prevent things that were prevented before without them.
The TSA's insistence on passengers (and flight crews) following whatever draconian rules they come up with, just because they said so, breeds an attitude of extreme authoritarianism. And this leads to the job attracting exactly the wrong type of people: those who enjoy abusing their authority and exerting control and dominance over people who are helpless to stop them. The only solution to this is careful hiring and rigorous training and the TSA does neither. The agency exists in a constant state of being overwhelmed and uses that as an excuse for not preventing its employees from abusing the people they're supposed to protect.
The point is not only that a lot of innocent people are being and will be harmed by these screenings, physically by the X-rays and mentally by having PTSD or other conditions triggered. The greater point is that the screenings come with A MUCH HIGHER COST THAN BENEFIT. THAT is why large numbers of people are finally resisting the TSA's abuse of authority (years after we should have started resisting...) Because the new screenings cross the line into doing more harm than good.
ETA: Here's another
article, from The American Prospect, that says the TSA has not even conducted cost/benefit analysis before deciding to deploy the scanners.
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