Friday, January 8, 2016

Legal child molestation

A father posted a video of his 10-year old daughter getting a TSA enhanced pat-down after they found her smuggling a Capri Sun (Horrors!) through security. Watching this video literally made my stomach turn, and it is an excellent reminder of why my children and I haven't flown since widespread use of the scanners and associated pat-downs.

It is also disturbing to read the defenses of the TSA procedures in this case. For example, one blogger wrote:
Sure, it probably felt awkward to be singled out. And yes, it was inconvenient. But I’m having a hard time understanding how this simple pat-down crossed any lines.
 "Awkward" and "inconvenient" are not nearly strong enough words for how I would feel about be the object of such a pat-down, let alone how a child might feel or a loving parent might feel seeing this happen to their child. I will grant that I am more sensitive than some (many? most?) others; my husband, for example, opts-out and feels akin to "awkward" and "inconvenienced". But, some of the words I would use if this applied to me or my children are: Violated, Molested, Assaulted, etc...