Seattle Resturant Bans TSA Officers

ScottM

ScottM

Taxi to Parking
Joined
Jul 19, 2005
Messages
42,529
Location
Variable, but somewhere on earth
Display Name
Display name:
iBazinga!
Good on' em. Next up - require TSA agents to allow full body fondling before being served food.
 
yep, neat gimmick, will probably get a few people in the door for a few weeks.
 
Meh. The agents themselves are merely doing a task and collecting a paycheck. This sort of reminds me of the anti-Vietnam protesters who were bent on vilifying the common soldier.
The TSA's policies are totally wrongheaded and invasive, not to mention ineffective... but unemployment is also really high, and the TSA screeners, for the most part, are not coming from economic situations that allow them to be very choosy about the grand wisdom and ethics of their employer when they need a job right now.
This seems to me to be poorly directed outrage.
 
This used to be done with black people.
 
Anthony said:
And Irish and Jews and Italians. What's your point? Why bring race into a non-racial issue? WTF?
Click to expand...

I figured the parallel would be obvious: let's exclude everyone we don't like from places held open to the public. :rolleyes:
 
Obi Heed Kenobi said:
I figured the parallel would be obvious: let's exclude everyone we don't like from places held open to the public. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...


Your logic escapes me, but since you live in Georgetown. Whatever. :D
 
Obi Heed Kenobi said:
I figured the parallel would be obvious: let's exclude everyone we don't like from places held open to the public. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Except as prohibited by law, I can exclude anyone I damn well please from my owned or leased property. TSA employees are not a protected class.
 
Obi Heed Kenobi said:
I figured the parallel would be obvious: let's exclude everyone we don't like from places held open to the public. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Except we already do that to smokers and smelly people. I consider TSA agents to be more vile than both.

And lest anyone claim the "Just doing their job" line, remember, their job is to provide security, not to molest old women and treat people like ****.
 
Telemakhos said:
The TSA's policies are totally wrongheaded and invasive, not to mention ineffective... but unemployment is also really high, and the TSA screeners, for the most part, are not coming from economic situations that allow them to be very choosy about the grand wisdom and ethics of their employer when they need a job right now.
This seems to me to be poorly directed outrage.
Click to expand...
Unemployment was really high in the 1930s when Hilter and the Nazis were looking for a few guys that would just follow orders.
 
SkyHog said:
And lest anyone claim the "Just doing their job" line, remember, their job is to provide security, not to molest old women and treat people like ****.
Click to expand...
Bad people find their way into many professions. There are some real creeps in the TSA, I'm sure, but also some real creeps working in bakeries, police forces, schools, and banks.
The restaurant owners clearly have a problem with TSA policy here, and I'm certain that your average screener can't get Janet Napolitano on the phone for a heart to heart followed by some fundamental policy change.
 
SkyHog said:
Except we already do that to smokers and smelly people. I consider TSA agents to be more vile than both.

....
Click to expand...

For those, you've got an actual reason for doing it.
 
Excellent!!!! I don't care if they're just doing their job. If the job is evil, you're still evil if you do it.
 
sba55 said:
Excellent!!!! I don't care if they're just doing their job. If the job is evil, you're still evil if you do it.
Click to expand...


This logic was applied to me as a Nuclear Weapons Technician by well-intentioned Freeziots.

I rejected it then, and I do know.

The TSA mission is not "evil" -- it's inconvenient, invasive, theater, and doubtfully effective.

But "Evil?"

Puh-leese.
 
ScottM said:
Unemployment was really high in the 1930s when Hilter and the Nazis were looking for a few guys that would just follow orders.
Click to expand...
Forgive me: I can't tell if you're being serious or not. I understand your fondness for bringing Der Fuhrer into everything.
Assuming you're making a serious point about the willingness of ordinary people to follow barbaric orders, then I would say that the incredibly toxic and pervasive climate of nationalistic pride and Antisemitism that prevailed after WWI and the collapse of the Weimar republic had more to do with the ensuing genocide than unemployment. In that case, you'll notice, the SS were revered as heroes by the public... whereas now the TSA agents are almost unilaterally viewed as mall cops with federal authority and a molestation mandate. They command no respect and are universally derided. So, it's a different situation altogether.
 
ScottM said:
Unemployment was really high in the 1930s when Hilter and the Nazis were looking for a few guys that would just follow orders.
Click to expand...

To avoid Godwin'ing a thread by mentioning the "Nuremburg defense" I like to use the U.S. post-civil war Andersonsville trial. :wink2:
 
I guess I have to feel a bit for the agents. I don't like their mission, but they are just doing a job, and its not like they're eating kittens or anything.
 
Jim Logajan said:
Sounds vaguely similar to the rationale Henry Wirz might have used - though he had even greater fear than lack of a paycheck to motivate his actions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ1h2kh1tHE
Click to expand...
As soon as the TSA corrals travelers into a large pen and holds them there with no potable water, food, or sanitation facilities, resulting in the death of 30% of those travelers, then we'll start making Henry Wirz comparisons.
Please, guys, I'm not standing up for the TSA. I really don't like their policy. But I also don't think that the TSA screen procedures are evil or that the people who perform them are evil. Unconstitutional? Probably. Evil? No.
 
Telemakhos said:
As soon as the TSA corrals travelers into a large pen and holds them there with no potable water, food, or sanitation facilities, resulting in the death of 30% of those travelers, then we'll start making Henry Wirz comparisons.
Please, guys, I'm not standing up for the TSA. I really don't like their policy. But I also don't think that the TSA screen procedures are evil or that the people who perform them are evil. Unconstitutional? Probably. Evil? No.
Click to expand...


Youre right, but aren't aware of Scott's reductionist bent, common to readers of HuffPo and exposure to other brain shrinking effluvia such as Bill Maher.
 
Telemakhos said:
Assuming you're making a serious point about the willingness of ordinary people to follow barbaric orders, then I would say that the incredibly toxic and pervasive climate of nationalistic pride and Antisemitism that prevailed after WWI and the collapse of the Weimar republic had more to do with the ensuing genocide than unemployment.
Click to expand...

One does not need any particular social climate to demonstrate that ordinary people will follow barbaric orders. Repeated experiments by psychologists have shown a predilection of people to follow the orders of authority figures, even when said orders violate their own conscience.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

"Ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority." - Milgram, Stanley. (1974), "The Perils of Obedience." Harper's Magazine. Abridged and adapted from Obedience to Authority.

I believe the evidence is clear that can be amended to include even victims. Whether it is a call to arms to sacrifice one's life for the greater good or to "put up" with invasive security procedures. So long as it is being requested by a figure of authority.
 
Obi Heed Kenobi said:
For those, you've got an actual reason for doing it.
Click to expand...

So? If it's not prohibited by law, I need no reason to exclude anyone I damn well please from my property. Provided my reason isn't one prohibited, and employment with the TSA is not a protected class, it doesn't need to be a good reason.

I would be perfectly free to say "No lawyers allowed", or "No IT Geeks Allowed"
 
dmccormack said:
Youre right, but aren't aware of Scott's reductionist bent, common to readers of HuffPo and exposure to other brain shrinking effluvia such as Bill Maher.
Click to expand...
Whoa, there. Scott didn't get all Henry Wirz on us, that was someone else.

If I had a restaurant, I'd ban HuffPo writers from it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top