TSA Airlines Insisted Woman Remove Her Piercings

[DoomTart]

A pierced woman set off the metal detector on pre-boarding causing her to be pulled aside for an additional scan. She told security that her nippes were pierced and they insisted she had to remove her nipple rings before being allowed to board her flight even though she offered to privately show a female officer that all she had under her clothes was jewelry.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080327/...s/nipple_rings

So, now we are supposed to be afraid of jewelry?

[Bikerpunk]

Fuck the TSA.

One of them went through my bags... but that's another story.

[One Eyed Cat]

haha it doesn't surprise me somehow. A guy passed cock check though here in MPLS (multiple piercings, just had to show em). Still, it can be really annoying having to wait for the keystone cop gig to run its course.

OEC

[cate]

What a great opportunity that could have been for her to whip her shirt off right there in the airport, making everyone fidget, stammer and look at their feet!

[Lady Alias]

I guess I'm the Devil's Advocate here, but I don't see the problem.

Hypothetically, someone could get away with concealing a weapon under the guise of "oh, it's just my private piercing" and not take the piercing off to assure there is no other source metal.
Also, I mean...how does someone not think their piercings are going to make the detector go off? Just don't put the private piercing in the day you go to the airport to avoid the hubalub.

[One Eyed Cat]

I guess I'm the Devil's Advocate here, but I don't see the problem.

Hypothetically, someone could get away with concealing a weapon under the guise of "oh, it's just my private piercing" and not take the piercing off to assure there is no other source metal.
Also, I mean...how does someone not think their piercings are going to make the detector go off? Just don't put the private piercing in the day you go to the airport to avoid the hubalub.

I think the sentiment is more one of bemused contempt. Like I said in a previous thread, they are relatively polite. It is just a bit funny yet annoying when it happens. I do have some liberty issues with it. I am too pragmatic to keep this issue on my radar screen though.

OEC

[DoomTart]

I guess I'm the Devil's Advocate here, but I don't see the problem.

Hypothetically, someone could get away with concealing a weapon under the guise of "oh, it's just my private piercing" and not take the piercing off to assure there is no other source metal.
Also, I mean...how does someone not think their piercings are going to make the detector go off? Just don't put the private piercing in the day you go to the airport to avoid the hubalub.

Piercings do not always set off a metal detector. The woman in question claims she flies quite a bit and this is the first time she set off the detector. Taking a private piercing in and out is not that easy, especially with the larger gauges. The problem I have is with dignity; it is not too difficult to determine where and what the metal is, quietly resolve the situation without public spectacle and embarrassment and get on with it, there was absolutely no reason to put that woman through all that humiliation.

My husband has internal staples that have set off metal detectors at a couple of hospitals, my mother has a metal hip and my brother had 2 metal pins in his leg, so how do you prove that you are safe? Does this mean that they are no longer allowed to fly?

[DoomTart]

As an update; I just heard on the news that TSA has apologized and is changing their policies regarding body piercings.

[Morning Glory]

yeah, generally they won't go off on a MD. the reason for that is that if you set the MD to be that sensitive, then it will be going off on everything. and that presents it's own problem because you have to take the time to isolate what it is that is setting it off. like people said before, it can be a medical screw, whatever.

there is some grounds for it though, because to detect the wiring on say a bomb, then you do have to turn it down to go off on earing gauge thickness.

to really be as safe as necessary to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, it would take super invasive techniques and lots of time, all of which are extremely impractical in most situations dealing with mass amount of people that want to get somewhere in the least amount of time.

all you can really do is MD, pull aside and hand wand the person. it seems fairly unlikely that the chick is packing semtex in her playtex. She could have discreetly flashed her bra to a female checker, and that would have been it.

embarrassing, yes. But like I said, it's all about safety vs practicality. you gotta decide which is more important, and it's not always an easy answer.

However, I think there is more to this story as the woman was also wearing a belly ring and she wasn't asked to take that out, and she said that they were giggling and acted amused at the situation. the way she paints it out it was more than a matter of inconvenience, but a situation of humiliation where it they did it just because they could, without a real reason.

[Amelia G]

embarrassing, yes. But like I said, it's all about safety vs practicality. you gotta decide which is more important, and it's not always an easy answer.

As an American patriot, I find the answer very easy. Like Ben Franklin said, "Those who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security deserve neither liberty nor security."

[ForrestBlack]

Land of the free, home of the brave.

Like the lady at the front door says:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

It doesn't say 'Our authoritarian goons will make sure nobody steps out of line in the name of organized social control.' We cannot allow this country, of all countries, to turn into some factory farm, fattening us all up on corn syrup and rotting our brains with nearly the worst educational system in the world. We're supposed to be better than that.

America was build for freedom, not coddled candy ass existence under the security of an all powerful authority. Our nation was built on individual resistance to those that would infringe on our basic freedoms in the name of some ethereal greater good. We are supposed to be a cowboy culture and that's what makes us great. Sometimes dangerous, but that's just built into our maverick nature. This c-change in culture is undermining the very foundation of what we're supposed to be about.

[Mr Karl]

Land of the free, home of the brave.

Like the lady at the front door says:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.


.

where is that from?

[Amelia G]

where is that from?

I suppose one could argue that is was from our French allies, but it is on the Statue of Liberty.

[ForrestBlack]

I suppose one could argue that is was from our French allies, but it is on the Statue of Liberty.

And to me, the salient point regarding the goals and aspirations of those seeking to join the American way of life is that they are indeed yearning to breathe free. Free from oppression, free from intolerance, free from rigorous confines and limitations of social class, and in order to maintain that personal liberty and freedom, we must resist authoritarian invasions of our private and personal lives. We must resist the unreasonable fear and suspicion fomented by our current 'protectors' in order to achieve our true greatness. The amount of money and resources that goes into supposedly protecting us from ourselves, particularly evident in the airline industry, is absurd as compared to the actual threat. I'd be perfectly happy if they had bouncers/security on airplanes, but not being allowed to possess liquids or even tiny bits of metals they don't socially approve of is simply over the line. It's a wonder they still let people on with their shoe laces these days.

[aXa]

this is one of the prime reasons i hate to fly. going in to the airport not knowing how much of a big deal my 20-odd piercing will be in the security check. i last flew this past december. took out all my metal piercings before leaving home. i felt strange the whole time they were out. sort of naked and self conscious..

[Mr Karl]

I suppose one could argue that is was from our French allies, but it is on the Statue of Liberty.

didn't know that.......interesting

[bohoki]

sounds like people got to go to plastic piercings

the old punk was safety pins the new punk is nylon zip (cable) ties

[bohoki]

damn uneditable posts

they also come in a veritable cornucopia of colors
strangly i seem ot be out of black

[rikosaka]

That reminds me of the scene in Spinal Tap with the cucumber wrapped in aluminum foil. Though nowadays if you pulled that out of your pants you would probably get shot at the aiprort.

[evilstonermonkey]

hmm... are foil hats allowed on planes?

[Creepshow]

lol. good question, evilstonermonkey.
anyways, my friend shane was telling me about that. thats bull shit, why didnt they just use the little scanner thingy?
crazy people...