“Travelling by airplane in the US is nothing more than mass training of Americans to the requirements of the coming police state. The whole point is to make you learn to acquiesce without question, en masse, to completely absurd directives by dull functionaries wearing uniforms.”
4 thoughts on “Truest line of the day, so far”
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I last flew a few months after 9/11. The nonsense of removing my shoes and being patted down were nothing compared to the despair of seeing soldiers with machine guns *everywhere.*
It is my opinion that the baring of thousands of feet in the same small space every day is far more of a danger to our national well being than the threat of someone having something dangerous hidden inside their shoes. Perhaps I’m overly obsessive about it, but I shudder every time I think of all the fungi and germs we are being forced to pass around!! Even if I am already wearing socks, I try to remember to take along some extra socks, so I don’t have to put transfer those millions of microbes from less hygenic people to the inside of my shoes. Even still, I have to handle those socks afterward. Ugh. Plus, more often than not there is no where to sit and put them on before going through, so it’s a real balancing act. And, I ask you, where does a person need their gel insoles more than when they are running around a bunch of airports and being on their feet for hours on end?!
“… absurd directives by dull functionaries wearing uniforms.”
That’s precisely why I don’t fly any more.
As someone who flies way too much (5 planes this week), I don’t mind the rules (machine guns are gone for the most part).
The rules most often complained about: liquid carry-ons and removal of shoes are not proactive measures. These are reactive measures because somebody tried to do something. If there was no response, who is to say they wouldn’t try again and get it right this time? For the sake of my family, the comfort provided(real or imagined) is well worth the extra hassle. Therefore, I question why these are absurd. Maybe I am missing a directive, but other than proving you are who you say you are, I think I covered them. In today’s world, complacency is dangerous, no matter where you live.
This is not a US issue, either. The gyrations one must go through to fly in the US are the same in Europe and worse in other parts of the world. Heathrow now makes you go through one x-ray machine for baggage and shoes on and then you go to a second line and just take off your shoes and pass them through. Ostensibly, this is to save time. Amsterdam, is the best because there is a security checkpoint at each gate. Alas, you still have to take off your shoes.