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IPFS News Link • Transportation: Air Travel

TSA Enhanced Pat Downs : The Screeners Point Of View

• BodyScannerTruth.com

[ABST ed - this is a great article.  However none of the TSOs arguments hold.  They are not there to follow orders, they are not protecting America by sexually assaulting children, grandmothers, cancer patients, men, and women.  None of them recognize what they are doing is ILLEGAL.  Our comments to the TSOs should be focused on getting them to rebel, not name-calling.]

In the past few weeks since the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) implemented its new “enhanced” pat down procedures there has been considerable backlash from the traveling public. This backlash has been loud and angry … but what is not heard or seen in the media is the quiet resentment of this new policy within the TSA.

A few days ago I contacted 20 TSA Transportation Security Officers (TSO) to ask their opinions of the new “enhanced” pat downs. Of the 20 I reached out to, 17 responded. All 17 who responded are at airports where the new “enhanced” pat down is in place … and the responses were all the same, that front line TSOs do not like the new pat downs and that they do not want to perform them.  I expected most to not like the pat downs … but what I didn’t expect was that all 17 mentioned their morale being broken down.

Each of the 17 TSA TSOs that responded to me detailed their personal discomfort in conducting the new pat downs, with more than one stating that it is likely they are more uncomfortable performing the pat down than passengers are receiving them.

Some comments from these TSOs include:

It is not comfortable to come to work knowing full well that my hands will be feeling another man’s private parts, their butt, their inner thigh. Even worse is having to try and feel inside the flab rolls of obese passengers and we seem to get a lot of obese passengers!”

Do you think I want to go to work and place my hands between women’s legs and touch their breasts for a few hours? For starters, I am attracted to men, not women and if I was attracted to women, it would not be the large number of passengers I handle daily that have a problem understanding what personal hygiene is.”

Yesterday a passenger told me to keep my hands off his penis or he’d scream. Is this how a 40 year old man in business attire acts? He’ll scream? My 3 year old can get away with saying he’ll scream, but a 40 something business man? I am a professional doing my job, whether I agree with this current policy or not, I am doing my job.  I do not want to be here all day touching penises.”

Being a TSO means often being verbally abused, you let the comments roll off and check the next person, however when a woman refuses the scanner then comes to me and tells me that she feels like I am molesting her, that is beyond verbal abuse.  I asked the woman if she thought I like touching other women all day and she told me that I probably did or I wouldn’t be with the TSA. I just want to tell these people that I feel disgusted feeling other peoples private parts, but I cannot because I am a professional.”

I was asked by some guy if I got excited touching scrotums at the airport and if it gave me a power thrill. I felt like vomiting when he asked that. This is not a turn on for me to touch me it is in fact a huge turn off. There is a big difference between how I pat passengers down and a molester molesting people.”

Aside from the issue of TSA TSOs being required to physically touch passengers in places they do not want to be touching them during the ‘enhanced’ pat down, morale is decreasing for front line TSOs, due in part to an increase in verbal abuse.  Each of the 17 TSOs who responded to me detailed a new level of verbal abuse they are experiencing at work.

The TSA has experienced a high level of turn over since its inception, however its turnover rate has decreased recently. With this decrease in morale, caused directly by a change in TSA policy, it is likely to begin experiencing a higher than average turn over again … which will further decrease the effectiveness of airport security.

Some comments from these 17 TSOs include:

Molester, pervert, disgusting, an embarrassment, creep. These are all words I have heard today at work describing me, said in my presence as I patted passengers down. These comments are painful and demoralizing, one day is bad enough, but I have to come back tomorrow, the next day and the day after that to keep hearing these comments. If something doesn’t change in the next two weeks I don’t know how much longer I can withstand this taunting. I go home and I cry. I am serving my country, I should not have to go home and cry after a day of honorably serving my country.

I come to work to do my job. It is not up to me to decide policy, it is up to me to carry out my duties as dictated by the Transportation Security Administration. When a person stands in front of me and calls me a pervert or accuses me of molesting them it is disheartening. People fail to understand that neither of us are happy about the intrusive pat down I am carrying out.  I am polite, I am professional and while someone may not like what I have to carry out, they came to me because they choose not to utilize the alternative and less invasive method of security at my airport.

I served a tour in Afghanistan followed by a tour in Iraq. I have been hardened by war and in the past week I am slowly being broken by the constant diatribe of hateful comments being lobbed at me. While many just see a uniform with gloves feeling them for concealed items I am a person, I am a person who has feelings. I am a person who has served this country. I am a person who wants to continue serving his country. The constant run of hateful comments while I perform my job will break me down faster and harder than anything I encountered while in combat in the Army.

Do people know what a Nazi is? One can’t describe me as a Nazi because I am following a security procedure of designed to find prohibited items on a passenger’s body. A Nazi is someone with hatred and ignorance in their hearts, a person who carried out actions of execution and extermination of those based on their religion, origins or sexual preferences.  I work to make travel safer, even if I do not agree with the current security procedures. Further more, I am Jewish and a TSA Transportation Security Officer, an American Patriot and to call me a Nazi is an offense beyond all other offenses.

There are multiple sides to every story, and I think the point of view of those on the front lines of the TSA, those required to carry on the policy and procedures created by the TSA, are an import part of this story. I think those organizing efforts to change the TSA’s policy should also consider the impact to the TSA TSOs.

Rather than dehumanize the TSA TSOs, work with them, understand their views and opinions and work together to change the current TSA policies.

Happy Flying!

 

5 Comments in Response to

Comment by Ned The Head
Entered on:

This one cuts deep

 "The constant run of hateful comments while I perform my job will break me down faster and harder than anything I encountered while in combat in the Army.

Ah yes, a lot of psychological torture involves this breaking down of the human character. Very effective techniques developed in part by your own government. We seek to make you feel utterly isolated, hated and hopeless. Except this time nobody is giving orders, there's no organized force, the people are telling you they hate you because they actually do.

I know. All  you are doing is what you get paid to do. You hated squeezing people's balls in Afghanistan and you hate it here. But where else does a guy get a job when his only qualifications are squeezing people's balls and killing them?

Comment by Anonymous
Entered on:

 'I'm only doing my job.'

Same pathetic b.s. heard at assorted trials after WW II.   Perhaps, if we're lucky, the results will be the same.

Comment by Mike Chavez
Entered on:

I was wondering... who are these people that allow the TSA to violate them?

Then I wondered... who in the f### would be a TSA violating other people?

It takes two to play any game- and what a f'd up game this is turning out to be. 

Comment by Anonymous
Entered on:

I had a different idea for that violin, but then I read the article, and the expressed emotions of the poor "TSOs".  I feel it's only right to respond to them individually.

To: "It is not comfortable to come to work knowing full well that my hands will be feeling another man’s private parts, their butt, their inner thigh. Even worse is having to try and feel inside the flab rolls of obese passengers and we seem to get a lot of obese passengers!”...

Then keep your pervert hands off of people.

To:  Do you think I want to go to work and place my hands between women’s legs and touch their breasts for a few hours? For starters, I am attracted to men, not women and if I was attracted to women, it would not be the large number of passengers I handle daily that have a problem understanding what personal hygiene is.”

There's this thing called "honest work"...

To: Yesterday a passenger told me to keep my hands off his penis or he’d scream. Is this how a 40 year old man in business attire acts? He’ll scream? My 3 year old can get away with saying he’ll scream, but a 40 something business man? I am a professional doing my job, whether I agree with this current policy or not, I am doing my job.  I do not want to be here all day touching penises.”

And yet you come back, day after day.  BTW, that's the "pedophile defense" ("I don't want to, but I can't help it...").

To: Being a TSO means often being verbally abused, you let the comments roll off and check the next person, however when a woman refuses the scanner then comes to me and tells me that she feels like I am molesting her, that is beyond verbal abuse.  I asked the woman if she thought I like touching other women all day and she told me that I probably did or I wouldn’t be with the TSA. I just want to tell these people that I feel disgusted feeling other peoples private parts, but I cannot because I am a professional.”

Perverts can't be professional?

To:  I was asked by some guy if I got excited touching scrotums at the airport and if it gave me a power thrill. I felt like vomiting when he asked that. This is not a turn on for me to touch me it is in fact a huge turn off. There is a big difference between how I pat passengers down and a molester molesting people.”

No, there's not.  To paraphrase one of your "sister" agencies, "If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck..."

To: Molester, pervert, disgusting, an embarrassment, creep. These are all words I have heard today at work describing me, said in my presence as I patted passengers down. These comments are painful and demoralizing, one day is bad enough, but I have to come back tomorrow, the next day and the day after that to keep hearing these comments. If something doesn’t change in the next two weeks I don’t know how much longer I can withstand this taunting. I go home and I cry. I am serving my country, I should not have to go home and cry after a day of honorably serving my country.

Ah!  But that's the point:  you are NOT "honorably" serving by knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily violating the 4th Amendment and untold numbers of state laws.  You ARE everything those courageous few call you, and your "pedophile defense" fails every "next day" and "day after that".

To:  I come to work to do my job. It is not up to me to decide policy, it is up to me to carry out my duties as dictated by the Transportation Security Administration. When a person stands in front of me and calls me a pervert or accuses me of molesting them it is disheartening. People fail to understand that neither of us are happy about the intrusive pat down I am carrying out.  I am polite, I am professional and while someone may not like what I have to carry out, they came to me because they choose not to utilize the alternative and less invasive method of security at my airport.

Yes, and the Jews shot in mass executions at Auschwitz & Treblinka "chose not to" utilize the ovens.

To: I served a tour in Afghanistan followed by a tour in Iraq. I have been hardened by war and in the past week I am slowly being broken by the constant diatribe of hateful comments being lobbed at me. While many just see a uniform with gloves feeling them for concealed items I am a person, I am a person who has feelings. I am a person who has served this country. I am a person who wants to continue serving his country. The constant run of hateful comments while I perform my job will break me down faster and harder than anything I encountered while in combat in the Army.” 

This is so stunningly stupid that it's difficult to conceive an appropriate response.  But I'll try.  First, what government did you "serve" in Afghanistan?  It certainly wasn't a government 1) limited by a Constitution; that 2) you would've sworn an oath to uphold and defend.  The false flag on your shoulder proves you didn't serve "this country", and you can't "continue to serve" by knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily violating the 4th Amendment and untold numbers of state laws.   Like the rednecks used to tell the hippies:  Love it or leave it.

To:  Do people know what a Nazi is? One can’t describe me as a Nazi because I am following a security procedure of designed to find prohibited items on a passenger’s body. A Nazi is someone with hatred and ignorance in their hearts, a person who carried out actions of execution and extermination of those based on their religion, origins or sexual preferences.  I work to make travel safer, even if I do not agree with the current security procedures. Further more, I am Jewish and a TSA Transportation Security Officer, an American Patriot and to call me a Nazi is an offense beyond all other offenses.

Clearly, YOU don't know what a Nazi is, or even that the soldiers serving that government were also "following [a] security procedure" EVERY TIME they pulled the trigger, flipped the switch, or turned on the gas.  If you actually are a Jew, which I doubt, your family must be very proud.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comment by Tracy Twyman
Entered on:

 Strike up the violin...


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