I’m all for traveling. However, I don’t like having kids on my flight; as soon as they get on an airplane they get antsy so they cry and vomit. This does not bode well with me.
Recently, the Manchester Airport decided to try out a new X-ray security check called the Rapiscan, which is used on all passengers except children. If successful, this mode of security could be adopted internationally.
The scan itself reportedly “works by beaming electromagnetic waves onto passengers as they stand in a booth, creating a virtual three-dimensional black-and-white “˜naked’ image from the reflected energy and sending it to a computer monitor elsewhere in the airport where it is examined by a security officer,” according to an article written in the Daily Mail. Then the image is deleted after 20 seconds.
Airport security guards are not permitted to scan children because it has been constituted as child pornography. According to the Daily Mail, the civil rights group Action on Rights for Children “argues the machines are disproportionately intrusive and remove a child’s right to dignity.”
But patting them down is OK.
Accusing the security check of being a means of creating porn is borderline insane. Besides, if the dignity of children is compromised then the dignity of those over the age of 18 is as well. If that machine makes child pornography, then it must be making pornographic images of everyone walking through.
You know, parents, if you don’t want your children to go through the indignity of airport security searches, you don’t have to travel by plane.
Personally, I think the Rapiscan is brilliant. By using this scan, I can keep my shoes on in the airport, and more importantly, keep other people’s shoes on.
I also tend to pile on jewelry, and it would be really great if airport security would stop mocking me when I have to take all of it off and then put it back on 30 seconds later.
Action on Rights for Children isn’t looking at the big picture. Its members should understand that making children go through security checks is teaching the kids how to function in society.
Everybody gets scanned for the betterment of everybody’s security. Individual sacrifice makes for a more orderly civilization.
Besides, this X-ray isn’t going to destroy a child’s dignity; kids embarrass themselves enough on their own. Between throwing tantrums, wetting their pants and wearing “Team Edward” T-shirts, I think an X-ray should be the least of their parents’ worries.
For example, on my way to London this summer with the UCLA Shakespeare program, I sat directly across the aisle from a boy who was probably around 11 years old. As soon as I saw that I was going to be traveling a cramped foot-and-a-half away from this boy, I knew that my fortress of solitude was going to be under attack. Then I started hearing guttural noises from his direction.
I regret what happened next. I looked over for a quarter of a second and witnessed the boy violently heaving the innards of his stomach into multiple small bags while dripping with both tears and snot. I wanted to lean over and tell him, “This is why we can’t have nice things,” but I was too busy trying to block his image from my mind.
Where were the child’s protectors of dignity during that little episode?
The Rapiscan would prevent passengers from bringing weapons and explosives aboard an aircraft by creating an incredibly unsexy image that looks like a ghost and rivals the unsexiness of Miley Cyrus’ booty-shorts-and-pulled-up-shirt picture. Twenty seconds is all you can really tolerate looking at the Rapiscan image.
To call these images child pornography is not only extreme; it could be potentially dangerous and it impedes upon airport security’s efficiency and thoroughness. Parent and child advocacy groups should consider the greater good rather than oppose helpful technological advances that could end up saving lives.
Just as all passengers have their luggage scanned ““ oftentimes revealing a person’s most embarrassing worldly possessions ““ everyone should be subject to an X-ray scan.
Parents who are truly worried about a 20-second image exploiting their children can take a road trip. To throw away a perfectly brilliant machine would be foolish.
If it were up to me, I’d keep the Rapiscan and lose the kids.
If you, too, have an opinion, e-mail Nikki Jagerman at njagerman@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.