Saturday, August 27, 2011

Literary profiling on airplanes

Excuse me sir, would you mind stepping off the plane. Also gonna need to examine the contents of that Kindle.


By now most of us have probably been harassed by the TSA while waiting to board a plane. Just the other week the entire security area of Logan Airport ground to a halt while they examined the contents of my old lady's bag for about 20 minutes. No explanation about what they thought it was they saw, nor did they ask us any questions, they just shut the entire operation down while a series of alternately indifferent and overly-agitated official-looking mustachioed gentlemen came to stare at an x-ray blob on a screen that may or may not have been something worth wasting everyone's time over. Kind of like when my mother went in for the her first look at me on a sonogram. 


Turns out it was nothing to worry about for anyone, because the mysterious shape was... well, we still don't know. A brush maybe, we think.

"Can't I just open the bag and show you what it is?" I asked, finally getting pissed off, which is  one of the top three things you don't want to be in an American airport, I'm told. Right after Muslim and a really constipated-looked 17 year old Colombian girl.

We were slightly embarrassed, but I suppose it's all in the name of protecting us from the millions of terrorists who are plotting at this very moment as we speak, to moderately inconvenience us.

I was reminded about that incident by this blog post on Boston.com the other day about a Massachusetts man who thinks he was a victim of racial profiling. The piece is titled "That's Racist, Yo."  Just kidding, but that would have been pretty awesome. It's actually called "Racial Profiling First Hand"

The post tells the story of a passenger named Vance Gilbert who wrote to the ACLU complaining about how he was pulled off a plane just as it was about to take off and interviewed by state police because of his choice of reading material.

Read the entire letter over there to get the full context, but here's a quote:

"Now, I am a musician by trade and an amateur aviation historian, studying mostly European transport aircraft between WW1 and WW2, and some after. I was on my way to two different music festivals. When I travel I delve into reading about this era of aviation. I had taken out and was reading a book of Polish Aircraft circa 1946 and I was also looking at views of an Italian aircraft from 1921. I think you see where this is going..."
[Editor's note: He fixes the cable?]

Now, I'm no terrorist, although I do hate America and all of its infuriating freedoms, but here's one thing I don't think I would do if I were planning to blow up a plane: Read a book about how to do it right out in the open in front of every one.  This isn't a carton.  Villains just don't go around reading books about the dastardly shit they're got planned.


How to Cook Humans


The letter continues...
Policeman: "Sir, were you looking at a book of airplanes?"
Me: "Yes sir I was. I am a musician for money, but for fun I study old aircraft and build models of them, and the book I was reading was of Polish Aircraft from 1946."
Policeman: "Would you please go get that book so that i can see it?"
I go back onto the plane - all eyes are on me like I was a common criminal. Total humiliation part 2.
After a couple of minutes he says, "Why, this is all Snoopy Red Baron stuff..."
Me: "Yes sir, actually the triplane you see is Italian, from 1921 a little after World War 1..."
Policeman: "No problem here then, you can go on back on to the plane, sorry to inconvenience you...and have a nice flight".

Snoopy Red Baron stuff indeed. Setting aside his referential prowess for a moment, this was a seemingly measured, responsible reaction from the trooper. Good. But Gilbert was still shaken up by the incident, alleging the entire thing was a matter of racial profiling. Flying while black, I guess you'd say. He can just be thankful he wasn't committing an even bigger offense to historical aviation sensibilities that would have set off all sorts of other alarms: flying while Steampunk. 


That's technically not Steampunk -- some fucking nerd, reading this right now, I guarantee it

Or maybe it's simply a matter of literary standards? Perhaps the flight attendant in question disagreed with Gilbert's choice of reading material on the merits.  Now that's the type of profiling I can get behind. Instead of harassing would-be airline passengers for their appearance, let's start by yanking all the inexplicable James Patterson and Charlaine Harris fans right up out of their seats and frog-march them straight over to the gate-side book store in handcuffs to reconsider their crimes. Instead of bored high school equivalency graduates in polyester giving us the once over to scan for dangerous materials,  we could hire an army of 23 year old William Gaddis fans poised to explain in excruciating, pedantic detail why our taste in books is shit. (Not like those kids are gonna get jobs anywhere else, so it ends up killing two birds with one stone.) Forget the TSA. MORE LIKE TS ELIOT.

Either way, the important thing is, this piece on Boston.com has sparked some vigorous  debate. Granted, it's the exact same debate that every single newspaper story ever posted anywhere on the internet inspires every single day, namely, whether or not something is racist, but still, we're talking. It's a start.


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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Was it a dildo, in the bag? (Notice how I didn't say "your" dildo.)

said...

Ha, that would have been an awesome premise for a wacky Cameron Diaz romcom. They pull it out, we get embarrassed, then Michelle falls in love with Mathew Mconaughy somehow.

But no, I keep my dildo in my carry on.

Anonymous said...

Gun-shaped dildo, perchance?

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