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Put Those X-Ray Specs Back in Your Pocket, TSA!Last Thursday, the U.S. House of Representatives dealt a sharp blow to electronic voyeurs everywhere by placing extensive restrictions on the use of electronic body scanners as part of airport security. Known more colloquially as virtual strip searches, these machines produce strikingly graphic images of passengers’ bodies when they are utilized as part of the airport screening process. Those images reveal not just graphic images of “naughty parts,” but also intimate medical details like colostomy bags. That’s why were so excited that Representative Jason Chaffitz (R-Utah) and Representative Carol Shea-Porter (D-N.H.) offered an amendment to the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Authorization Act which passed the House last week. In it, they bar the use of these electronic strip searches as the primary means of screening, forbid the storage or misuse of images and make sure passengers have an alternative means of screening. Frankly, we don’t even think this should be controversial. When body scanners were introduced, they were presented as a secondary security option, to be used in a limited fashion. TSA promised that passengers would have other alternatives. Instead TSA is now using body scanners as the primary search tool in at least six airports. The Chaffetz-Shea-Porter Amendment simply holds TSA to its original stated intention for this intrusive technology. Since its creation, TSA has gone through a number of unpalatable screening options. First it was full body pat downs, especially of women’s breasts. Now it’s whole body imaging. We hope the Chaffetz-Shea amendment will be a spur to develop another, more privacy protective, search option. As we move onto the Senate, we’ll be asking: shouldn’t Americans in airports have better options than stripping or groping? If you want to email your Senator about airport security, please click here.
Tags: TSA
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Jun 9th, 2009 at 3:32pm
Airport? Government Spies Are Doing Warrantless Surveillance Inside the Homes of Unjustly "Targeted" Citizens and Families.
*** When Will ACLU Go After the "Extrajudicial Targeting/Torture Matrix" Spawned Under Bush Cheney and Countenanced By Team Obama? ***
http://nowpublic.com/world/gestapo-usa-govt-funded-vigilant e-network-terrorizes-america
Jun 9th, 2009 at 4:37pm
This is an outrage. Congress needs to do more than reign in TSA, it should allow Americans to take back the skies by abolishing the agency. http://bit.ly/rT43a
Jun 10th, 2009 at 1:01pm
Such behaviour is understandable from very young boys but we should expect better from governement agencies.
Jun 11th, 2009 at 6:25pm
It is my sincere belief that the ACLU is on the wrong topic. God is very involved in our life, and wants and needs our recognition. The ACLU is trying to deny that privileges to those who believe in God and His needs and Creation. I can not understand why anyone in the right mind would frond on the recognition of God, on a continual bases. You must rethink your objectives and goals. In essence, you are denying the population of America, the opportunity to worship God, or even think and discuss Him in a public way. In doing so, , the opportunity to worship God, you are going against nature of man kind. It is natural for us, man kind, to give thanks, for the blessings and good things that come our way in life. You are dead against this natural anomaly, which will never fly with the majority of Americans, or mankind.
For one who Loves God, I can not understand why you, or any one else, go to such lengths to deny Him.
John
quinte@sympatico.ca
Jun 12th, 2009 at 1:56pm
John...I am confused by what you write. I have never seen anything to suggest that the ACLU would take away anyone's rights to worship god, merely the government's right to decide which god (if any) to worship.
Try this, for every time you learn of something disturbing that the ACLU does that you think restricts your rights to follow your religion, re-read it and substitute another religion and its symbols. If you are not outraged, the ACLU is doing the right thing.
Jun 28th, 2009 at 12:08am
What is the ACLU's official policy on metal detectors in general? Do they support their use in airports, schools, ect.? Just wondering.
Jul 21st, 2009 at 5:07pm
Has the ACLU had dealings with defending against deafening gpsing/sound tortue and radio/voice imaging broadcasts. I don't know hoe they refer to them officially. Saw that Boeing was inventing mindreading bla bla for project monark This needs to be halted. They come in on sensors eg. inmy apt popular place is my fridge. Any info appreciatedc.