Full Body Screening: David Loftus

This seems like a tricky one but it isn’t, really. It seems to me that full-body scans are indeed an invasion of privacy … but not an unreasonable one, given that airports and airplanes are private property, and passengers are preparing to enter into an airborne craft with dozens, sometimes hundreds, of other human beings whose lives could be endangered by the malice or thoughtlessness of any one of them. (It amazes me that every once in a while, people try to board a jet having actually “forgotten” they have a loaded firearm in their luggage.) It’s one thing to effect a warrantless search of a vehicle on a public thoroughfare, or to enter a person’s home without permission or a warrant based on probable cause; it’s quite another to make sure potential terrorists or bozos are not stepping into an airplane with flammable or explosive materials, or a weapon.

There is no “right” to fly. There is no “right” to get from one place to another within a certain time, in a certain manner, without giving up any privileges, in vehicles that are owned and maintained by others. Sure, it’s an uncomfortable thought that some stranger may be looking at your body through your clothes for a moment; and sure, there’s bound to be an occasional jerk who will get off on the process, and possibly even try to preserve the images for his own use somehow. But given the tight controls and public nature of airport security, it’s hard to imagine anyone getting away with that, ultimately.

People have acclimated themselves to putting their life in their hands (or more accurately, in the hands of a crew of utter strangers) every time they board a huge white metal bullet that flies tens of thousands of feet above hard ground, mountains, oceans, and ice caps. Surely they can get used to this, too.