Government Peeping and Groping

Seems like a lot of people aren’t real crazy about having people take naked pictures of them or having their genitals groped by government officials.  While some people might not mind having beig virtually stripped and having their bodies exposed, there are the radiation hazards to consider.

The risk of harmful radiation exposure from backscatter scans is very small, according to David Brenner, director of the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University and a professor of radiation biophysics.

But he said he is concerned about how widely the scanners will be used.

“If you think of the entire population of, shall we say a billion people per year going through these scanners, it’s very likely that some number of those will develop cancer from the radiation from these scanners,” Brenner said.

Skin cancer would likely be the primary concern, he said. Each time the same person receives a backscatter scan, the small risk associated with the low dose of radiation is multiplied by the number of exposures.

Granted that the numbers and risks are small,  but so are the chances of a terrorist attack.

The probability of dying from radiation from a body scanner and that of being killed in a terror attack are roughly the same, he said. About one in 30 million.

“They’re both incredibly unlikely events. These are still a factor of 10 lower than the probability of dying in any one year from being struck by lightning in the United States.”

Fact is that most find exposing our body parts to the the government is what is most offencive.  There is also the question of children having their naked photographs taken by the government. Are these photos legally child porn?

We do have the right to abstain from being a participate in governments  photographic voyeurism if we let the package inspectors fondle our genitals. If we refuse all of it, we then expose ourselves to big fines and penalties.

The Transportation Security Administration has opened an investigation targeting John Tyner, 31, the Oceanside man who was ejected from the San Diego International Airport on Saturday morning after refusing to undertake a full body scan and, subsequently, a pat-down body search.

Tyner recorded the half-hour long encounter on his cell phone and later posted it to his personal blog, along with an extensive account of the incident. That blog and a subsequent story on signonsandiego.com posted Saturday night and gone viral, attracting hundreds of thousands of readers, and thousands of comments.

Michael J. Aguilar, chief of the TSA office in San Diego, called a press conference at the airport Monday afternoon to announce the probe. The investigation could lead to prosecution and “civil penalties” of up to $11,000, he said.

About Liberty

Blogging is something I do for myself. I've been blogging since Sept. 2003, mostly about politics, guns, and observations about the word around me.
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