A VERY interesting link that one:
As an airline pilot, I have to put up with this ridiculous farce everyday of my working life. The thing I find most worrying is that virtually all protagonists recognise this for what it is – security pornography. The sight of queues of hapless passengers being screened by security operatives for arbitrary irrelevant items must be gratifying for an administration obsessed by obedience and control.
As the pilot of your plane I am not permitted water or marmite, and more worryingly any substance which in the judgement of the security guard thinks might pose a risk. Perhaps my pack lunch, or a yoghurt that might be used to cut the profit margin of an airport retailer? Of course were I so minded, I need nothing to repeat the godless act of September 11th. I am in truth, the final arbiter of security and safety on board. The veracity of this fact is lost on the authorities, who still subject me and my crew to ritual humiliation and contempt, despite the fact that police officers and other security personnel are treated with a respectful ‘light touch’.
I find the whole experience wearying and frustrating. In my profession, the management of fatigue is becoming an increasingly difficult task, and the endless drudgery of wartime-UK is becoming a safety risk in itself. Recently I found myself so angered by my experience with the ‘chekist’ that I was unable to concentrate. I felt a very real impulsion to get off the aircraft.
We live in a post-democratic society. The UK is little better than the worst days of the DDR, with constant surveillance and slavish obedience to the state. Questions are not tolerated, dissent still less. One of my colleagues from another airline was summarily threatened with arrest for disputing the edict of one of the guards. If this is the freedom that Blair offers as an alternative to his constant threat of terror, then I will choose the status quo ante. I would rather live my life in freedom than live in the open prison of Blair’s anti-terrorist umbrella.
Unfortunately security has descended into a macabre sketch show, with each anecdote more ridiculous than the last. Security has become a joke, instead of the shared responsibility that it must be. That is the greatest danger of all.