Gwynne Dyer: Small acts of resisting airport security
The “tourists” (as South Africans used to call them in deliberate mockery of their attempts to terrorize everybody, and as George W. Bush also called them because he didn’t speak English very well) are always seeking to blow up our airplanes. Why else would we employ hundreds of thousands of people to stand around in airports and go through our baggage?
True, they haven’t actually caught anybody trying to board a plane with a bomb in the nine years since 9/11. Many terrorist plots were nipped in the bud by good intelligence work on the ground, but the few who did try to carry bombs onto aircraft (the shoe bomber, the underpants bomber, et cetera) got through “airport security” and were only defeated by their own incompetence.
Despite all this, the airport security industry continues to flourish. Indeed, it serves a useful social function, providing employment to many people who would otherwise be roaming the streets looking for something to do, and perhaps falling in with bad companions.
However, common sense and a grasp of irony do not figure prominently in the job description for airport security personnel. That’s why we are all conditioned, while going through airport security, to avoid making remarks that even refer to the reason for all these searches.
Should you politely inquire, as they ferret through an old lady’s handbag, whether they really think there’s a bomb in there, you will spend the next 12 hours in a sideroom being interrogated. Indeed, you don’t even have to get aboard an aircraft to fall afoul of the vast security establishment that has sprung up since 9/11. Just send an e-mail containing keywords like blowing up an aircraft, and they may visit you in the comfort of your own home.
That’s what happened to Paul Chambers, a 27-year-old British accountant. His flight to Northern Ireland to visit his girlfriend was cancelled when snow closed Nottingham’s Robin Hood airport last January, and he vented his anger to his girlfriend on Twitter. “Crap,” he wrote. “Robin Hood airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your shit together otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!!!”
Those who have lived among human beings for any length of time will recognize that as a lame attempt at humour, but if you spend your time in darkened rooms reading intercepted electronic messages you tend to lose contact with the human race. So Paul Chambers was arrested, charged, tried, and convicted. He was fined $1500 plus legal costs. And as soon as he was arrested, he lost his job.
He appealed his conviction, naturally, and in mid-November, Judge Jacqueline Davies rejected his appeal. She emerged from her cave to rule that Chambers’s tweet was “menacing in its content and obviously so. It could not be more clear. Any ordinary person reading this would see it in that way and be alarmed.”
So far, it’s just another dreary tale of overweening securocrats and out-of-touch judges, but what happened next was more heartening. Thousands of people who were outraged by sheer stupidity of it all began to re-tweet Chambers’s original message in a show of solidarity.
So far, none of the people who did this have been arrested, because some senior person in the British security establishment finally realized that the whole sorry story makes them and the judges look like fools. Or, to be more precise, reveals them for the fools they are. But it would not be a good idea to re-tweet Chambers’s message anywhere outside Britain, for the equally foolish authorities elsewhere don’t know the background story.
What you could do, if you are minded to make some small gesture of resistance to this ignorant and oppressive system, is to include some reference to bombs and aircraft in your e-mails and tweets from time to time. Be careful how you phrase it—“I heartily disapprove of people who try to smuggle bombs onto aircraft” would be a safe comment—but as long as you use the keywords, it will come to the attention of the system.
The computer will flag the message, and some analyst will actually have to read it. They won’t arrest you for it, although your name will probably go onto one of their databases. Don’t worry about that: if you have ever done anything remotely interesting in the world, your name is almost certainly on several of their databases already. And if enough people sent messages like that, it might even clog up the system.
Well, no, not really. Whenever they want more computing capacity, they get it, because no politician will risk being accused of stinting on “security matters”. In reality, your small act of resistance will simply trigger the waste of more of the money you pay in taxes: no matter what you do, the house wins. But it might make you feel better for a little while.
Comments
18 Comments
dan murphy
Nov 22, 2010 at 10:19am
gwynne's suggestion -- needs work
AW
Nov 22, 2010 at 11:00am
While Mr Dyer is an able historain how can he tell when a comment is or is not a joke? Should we assume all facebook and twitter comments are innocent jokes.
So it is OK for a old lady to make a comment? how abdout a young lady ? how about a male? how about a male of Arabic origin, does Dyer propose we start to profile people?
miguel
Nov 22, 2010 at 11:28am
Did Chambers' girlfriend get arrested for being a co-conspirator in his bomb plot? Or was the case just a state sponsored nuisance charge. You're in a bad situation when your govt. can victimize you.
Miguel
Strategis
Nov 22, 2010 at 7:52pm
It's all about the chill factor. Bit by bit, day by day, year by year, without even realising it, you are censoring not only your words, but your thoughts. And that is how a good police state works. By countless crafty measures, everyone is conditioned to live in fear and to censor and discipline not only themselves but each other. The police state is internalised, and we all become co-opted at the deepest level to be a part of the control mechanism that enslaves us all.
Ghenghis Khan and his Brother Don
Nov 22, 2010 at 11:35pm
AW, perhaps you should take a step back and breathe through the nose. The art and science of terrorist detection requires a little bit of common sense, don't you think?
Do you realize that the lack of discrimination (in the sense of at least making some attempt to determine who can really be a safety risk or not) in performing security duties may actually lead to someone getting through? (not that this is likely to happen....world-wide terrorist population density is quite low) For example, here in Canada there is a record industry executive who had his passport stolen many years ago and it was apparently used illicitly. Being a record executive requires for him to travel regularly to the US, and, every time he does so, he is stopped and grilled for hours. Perhaps, someday, while they're questioning this person, whom they must know by now is not and will never be a terrorist (the customs agents must be on first name terms with him by now), a real terrorist will quietly slip through the lines... Indiscriminately arresting everyone who says or writes "bomb" can hardly be a successful strategy.
May all your lives remain bomb-free
Ghenghis and Don (brother)
pwlg
Nov 23, 2010 at 4:57am
What is sorrily missed by what Dyer calls the securocrats and politicians is that every successful terrorist attack has been something not anticipated. From hijacking airplanes to running airplanes into architectural edifices, from releasing poisonous gas to placing bombs in subway tunnels to kidnapping politicians.
It is this creative and intelligent strategy by terrorists that makes each reaction just a bit more foolish.
Dyer does state that the most effective way to deter terrorism is with good intelligence.
After the bombing of the London underground, the British spy agency declared that it needed more money not for airport scanning devices but for training more spies and intelligence officers. They stated that this takes time to develop contacts etc.
If you want to experience the biggest folly of airport security pass through Yellowknife. It seems half the population of Yellowknife works for airport security. In the north not all airports have security so if you leave one of these airports you are forced to land in Yellowknife, get off the plane even though Yellowknife is not your destination, claim your bags even your checked baggage and go through security. Imagine a terrorist using Norman Wells as there point of departure where there is no airport security and one would have to walk hundreds of kilometers through muskeg and mosquitoes to reach Norman Wells in order to begin your terrorist endeavor.
Dyer's comment on not speaking those forbidden words, like bomb, or asking security why a 4 year old has to take off his shirt while going through airport security holds true for Yellowknife. Even looking pissed off by this stupid nonsense in Yellowknife will find yourself pulled aside and given the full monty search. Beware!
AW
Nov 23, 2010 at 9:01am
Correct G Khan
let's set some criteria, based on age , race, occupation etc. as to who gets stopped and who doesn't, that will get over the "indiscriminately arresting everyone," One of your American counterparts is incensed that a nun was searched......don't people realize that no self respecting "freedom fighter" would disguise themselves as a nun.. ..however I bow to the knowledge of generic experts such as you.
Leone
Nov 23, 2010 at 9:23am
What's wrong with smuggling balms onto planes anyway? As long as they are hypo-allergenic.
petr aardvark
Nov 23, 2010 at 10:29am
they stopped an old lady from bringing her knitting needles on the plane.
they were afraid she was going to knit an Afghan.
Petr
Ghenghis Khan and his Brother Don
Nov 23, 2010 at 11:39am
AW, name calling will get you nowhere. But I'd love to see *your* professional credentials...
I don't recall recommending exemption categories for anyone, including nuns. But do you really think we should go whole hog for every email that contains the word 'bomb'? Yes, perhaps a red flag should go up for security services when they find a message with "i'll blow up the airport", but no, they shouldn't do a full SWAT team raid on everyone who writes this. They should use their professional skills to separate the wheat from the chaff.
You may stop bowing now.
May peace and love fill your lives
Ghenghis Khan and Don (brother)