Behind the Ironic Column

It’s interesting how many things that are annoyances or worse are allowed to slide by because they’re “for your protection.”  This is a first cousin to the claim that I used to hear a lot years ago, but not so much anymore, that something was being done “for your own good.”  I never thought it was for my good then and I’m pretty dubious about its being for my protection now. 

Not that I object to security measures – I think we have to have them – but really, inspecting my luggage is for the protection of other people, isn’t it?  If I’m a relatively rational person I won’t have things in my luggage that would serve as weapons (nitpicking aside about the list of things they consider to be weapons).  If I’m not a rational person, then none of the argument applies so I’m just skipping over them.  The little notice of luggage being searched goes on to say that they may be looking for “prohibited” items.  That, I suspect, is really what they find most of the time.  Somebody trying to sneak something through that’s on the “you may not transport” list.   I don’t do that – the stuff in my luggage is innocuous; the only thing even close to making their list is 8 ounces of hair mousse.  It can’t go carryon so it has to be checked, but it’s not very exciting.

One of my email providers (yes, I do have several) has recently started giving me a little blurb that pictures have been blocked “to protect your privacy.”  I don’t mind that they block the graphics, because I told them to do that – I much prefer ordinary text email without all the cutesy things that can be added.  I’m not sure, and haven’t really bothered to try to find out, whether they’re blocking different things now, or just giving me that annoying little notice.  I don’t agree that pictures would affect my privacy anyway – unless someone has come up with two-way video that’s activated by sending someone else a picture.  That could be an interesting scenario. 

So far I still have the option to view any graphics that come in my email, and I have the option to use some other method of transportation or take no luggage if I don’t want somebody looking through it, but I am a little concerned about the further spread of things that are done in the name of “our own protection.”

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