The random naked eyeful is starting to replace the random groping at airport rights checkpoints. Passengers at Phoenix Sky Airport may now choose between being felt-up or seen naked by Big Brother or Big Sister. Yesterday, the Transportation Security Administration started using “backscatter” X-rays, which “can see through people’s clothes and show the body’s contours with blush-inducing clarity”, according to today’s Washington Post.
The feds insist that the images are blurred by software and discarded immediately after the tax-salaried Peeping Tom or Tammy is satisfied that the exposed citizen is carrying no weapons of plane destruction.
Sure.
All it takes is one software glitch for the already insufficient blurring to fail and give the TSA watchers an even clearer eyeful. All it takes is one unscrupulous government employee to save someone’s naked image and broadcast it to the world via YouTube.
This is dangerous. Government exists to protect all our rights, not to claim to protect some by violating others. Government employees should not take and view naked pictures of citizens. It’s that simple. And that this invasion is actually happening lays bare the enormity of federal overreach. We’ve accelerated down the slippery slope so fast that our naked buttocks are burned. Even George Orwell didn’t predict this.
Big Brother is watching you–naked.
After my misspent youth as a wage worker, I’m having so much more fun as a blogger, helping other discerning travellers plan fun and fascinating journeys. Read more …