I grew up poor. Why is this important?  I had absolutely no forms of identification.  No drivers’ license, no state-issued ID, not even a birth certificate or social security card to present.  I- or rather, my parents- had the two latter things SOMEWHERE (I was after all, born in this country), but they’d been lost ages prior. 

All that said, I was frequently put on a plane by myself since childhood to spend time with my grandparents (paid for by them) far across my very large state. My visits continued even in the years after 9/11.  Before, whereas I could breeze through security with absolutely no problem and have to show no documentation before being waved off to my flight with a smile, now found myself being pulled aside for “random additional screening” almost every single time.

Standing alone in the plexiglass box and being thoroughly wanded as I watched uniformed agents search every inch of my pink and purple duffel bag, pull out my clothes, poke and prod and wand the beloved childhood teddy bear I always traveled with before roughly stuffing it back into my bag became the new normal. 

The combination of my lack of identification, my later teenage years, and new security regulations suddenly made things even more difficult. 

The first time it happened, I approached the agent’s podium with ticket and boarding pass in hand. He demanded I show some kind of photo ID, which I told him I didn’t have. He asked where my parents were and I (truthfully) told him they’d already dropped me off and had left.  I didn’t have a cell phone to call them, either.  He told me to stand over at a nearby area he indicated towards and wait.  So I did. 

Shortly, I was approached by two men in suits who asked/told me to come with them.  We went into a part of the airport I thought I’d never see: down a hallway into a very administrative-looking wing that hardly resembled an airport at all.  They took me to a small, windowless room with dark walls that bore the words and official seal of the Department of Homeland Security on the door. Needless to say, I was intrigued and nervous at the same time. I was instructed rather gruffly to sit and wait inside at a metal table with a lone chair. It resembled every interrogation room you’ve ever seen on TV.  There was a camera mounted high up in one corner, pointed directly at me.

A man entered the room and began asking me questions.  My full name, my parents’ full names, where they worked, where I was going, where I lived, all kinds of different things.  He excused himself and walked out for a minute or two.  He came back, this time with a cell phone to his ear.  He was listening to someone on the other end and then asked me (clearly at the instruction of the voice on the phone), “What is your address?” I’d already told him this, but I repeated it just the same. He parroted it into the phone and listened for a few more moments.  “Is your father’s name Edward?” “Well, that’s his middle name.”  More listening. More instruction. “What color is the paint on your house?” That one thew me for a loop.

I told him (again, truthfully) that it was sort of a peach, with maroon trim.  Colors my dad had picked out and was rather proud of.  The agent once again repeated this information verbatim into the phone, listened, and with a few barely-audible “uh-huhs” and nods, hung up the phone and told me I was free to go.  I was escorted back to the security line and given a pass to go past the man on the podium, as well as a stern lecture to obtain some form of ID. 

I suppose I understand, that an unattended minor nearing legal adulthood with no ID, no cell phone, and a one-way ticket (this was a summer-long visit and my return date was to be determined later) is going to raise some red flags in today’s world. But it’s the fact that the color of the paint of my house was somehow known to them and was conditional toward my release that still gives me chills.  From the point that I returned home to the day we moved, I never looked at my house the same way again.  I felt like they were always watching.

By: Rose

  This is something I witnessed at the Denver Airport 4-5 years ago, preparing to return home after visiting a relative who lives in Colorado.  I’d made it through the long, snaking line to the part of the security checkpoint just before you step through the metal detector.  Directly in line in front of me was a woman who looked not all that dissimilar to myself- young, caucaisan, well-dressed, understated jewelry- who was pulled out of line and informed she had been “randomly selected for additional screening.” 

   She asked why, but was barked at to stand off to the side and prepare for a patdown.  She hadn’t set off the metal detector (hadn’t even gone through it yet), there was nothing even remotely suspicious about her.  Probably a college student or newlywed. As I went about my own process of removing my shoes, jewelry, placing my laptop and other small belongings in the provided bin, I watched and listened intently to what was going on with the other woman. 

   The overweight, middle-aged, gum-smacking TSA agent assigned to her sighed her way through her memorized spiel in the most disaffected, monotone voice possible about what was about to go down, the areas she was required to touch, how she was going to do it, etc.  The other woman protested still, but was  told it was either this or miss her flight.  She then asked if there was some kind of room they could go in or at the very least, a screen she could step behind and was told no. 

    The patdown ensued in all the usual places: shoulders, neck, breasts, stomach, one arm then the other, etc.  Then the legs.  The agent stopped short of the woman’s knees and in her continued dead-inside droning, told the searchee that she was now going to inspect her inner thighs and groin region.  The young woman was visibly and understandably uncomfortable, but agreed and the patdown continued.  Outer thighs, inner thighs, crotch.  But someting about the young woman’s crotch alerted the agent, who went back and did it again.  The agent said (far too loudly) that she felt something “foreign and unusual” in the groin area and called over either a supervisor or another agent, then asked her captive what was in her pants. 

   Embarrassed and trying to keep as much attention off her as possible, the young woman tried to tell the agents that she was on her period and was wearing a menstrual pad.  This apparently wasn’t good enough for the original agent, who copped another extremely thorough and invasive feel of the young woman’s privates.  She asked, “don’t you wear tampons?”  The poor girl, who up until that point displayed a remarkable patience and nerve I myself might not have in the same situation, tried to plead with the woman and tell her that she had run out and with not time to stop and buy some before leaving for the airport, simply borrowed a maxi pad from a relative.  

   Sadly I don’t have a satisfying end to the story because despite taking extra long to put on and re-button my coat, put on my shoes, and what have you in order to observe; that was about as much as I could take in without conspicuously staying in the area too long, thus drawing attention to myself and risking something similar happening to me. 

   It was a sight that absolutely disgusted me and all the way home I wished I’d have been able to give the poor girl a hug. I hope whoever the next president ends up being makes reforming or outright shutting down and replacing this horrible organization one of their number one priorities. Put a stop to all these rude, obstructive, power-tripping jerks who aren’t making us any safer than a school crossing guard. 

   This isn’t freedom.  This is fear. 

By: Rose

Some quick background: i travel about twice a year, mostly international, in particular, to Asia. I was born and raised in the USA. I’m early middle-aged. I’m also a college professor.

Many of the TSA agents are mean assholes. There’s no other way to put it. 

1. Just recently a TSA agent yelled at me, “MOVE FORWARD” like an unruly kid-bully in the lunchline at Elementary School. Apparently, he was waving his hand to motion me through. Problem was that he was waving his hand behind the X-ray machine. I don’t have X-ray vision, and neither does anyone else. Of course, he thinks it’s my problem, not his.

2. Another time, a few weeks before that, a TSA agent yells at me and a bunch of other people in line to not put our bags in a tray. Of course, he yells it rudely. And then he says “F*CK, I don’t know why everyone is putting their bags in trays when they’re not supposed to!!!”. I say “It’s probably because people don’t know”. He then turns and comes up to me, like an idiot half-wite meathead at a bar “What did you say to me???” I repeated myself: “I said: It’s probably because they don’t know that they’re not supposed to”. He then backs away and said “I’m yelling it over and over again, how can they not know?” I then say “Okay, either they hear you, listen to you, but consciously think “I don’t want to listen to that guy – I’d rather actually do exactly the opposite of what he’s saying. OR they don’t hear you because they’re trying to take off their shoes, belts, take out there laptops, jackets, etc. It’s hard to do that…”. He then says “People can’t follow directions, get back in line!!!” I say “Yes, that’s right, everyone’s not following SIMPLE directions, so the best explanation is that you’re smarter than everyone else, and everyone is just plane stupid.” He looks at me but I go through the scanner.

3. Another time, few weeks before that (this is at an airport in Nor Cal), a TSA agent yells at me for not taking everything out of my laptop sleeve, which I put in a separate tray container from my laptop. He says it very rudely: “Did you take everything out of your laptop sleeve?” I say “No”, since I left the power supply cord and mouse in it. “Do you not know how to follow directions? Take it all out!” I tell him: The sign right over there says ‘Take laptop out of the bag’. It says nothing about taking the laptop and everything else out of the bag. So, yes, i am following directions.” He says to me “What did you say?” I point to the sign and start to speak and he says “Move you’re holding up the line!”

Clearly, these TSA agents are unhappy with their lives and incredibly disgruntled. I feel for them. However, that explains why they’re assholes, but doesn’t excuse it. I was incredibly surprised by the lack of minimal intelligence in them – they were the type of people that would blame everyone rather than being reflective enough to realize that the problem lies with them and their system, especially if so many are having trouble (as they allege). 

By: Joe

Well known showhost, Colleen Lopez, of Home Shopping Network, was traveling, and upon arrival to her hotel room, she discovered all her jewelry in her locked suitcase or carry on, was stolen. Those TSA employees are lowlifes who deserve to burn in HELL!

By: Deborah Jones