4 ms·

> The TSA is responsible for creating the roadblock, and therefore should be responsible for keeping travelers whole. "read the rules" is not a justification fo

by ardy42 6y ago

> The TSA is responsible for creating the roadblock, and therefore should be responsible for keeping travelers whole. "read the rules" is not a justification for their policies, as it's common to have an arbitrarily-prohibited item hide in your bag. Especially the types of items that you want to live in your backpack (eg pocket knives) that you have to make sure to unpack before the airport. Knives aren't "arbitrarily-prohibited item[s]". There's a quite famous case of a series of hijackings that were done with box-cutters (e.g. utility knives), that resulted in 3,000 dead.

mindslight 6y ago
... and which will never succeed again. "Arbitrarily-prohibited" was a jab at everything else they've seen fit to condemn by extension, for example pliers. It's not just knives that you have to be concerned about, but anything remotely non-basic that you otherwise keep in your backpack.
- ardy42 6y ago
  > ... and which will never succeed again. That seems a little...overconfident. While some of the TSA stuff is definitely security theater that adds little value, not all of it is. > "Arbitrarily-prohibited" was a jab at everything else they've seen fit to condemn by extension, for example pliers. It's not just knives that you have to be concerned about, but anything remotely non-basic that you otherwise keep in your backpack. You can carry on pliers, just as long as they're less than 7 inches long: https://www.agefotostock.com/age/en/Stock-Images/Rights-Managed/G14-1968677 https://www.agefotostock.com/age/en/Stock-Images/Rights-Mana... https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/items/wrenchespliers https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/... The pair of pliers I have is 7.25 inches long. That rule seems quite reasonable to me. They do have a difficult task: write rules that can be executed quickly by relatively low-level employees to exclude items that could be used as a weapon or be a danger to the plane. I doubt that's even possible to do without creating corner cases that someone could gripe about.

by ardy42 6y ago

mindslight 6y ago

... and which will never succeed again. "Arbitrarily-prohibited" was a jab at everything else they've seen fit to condemn by extension, for example pliers. It's not just knives that you have to be concerned about, but anything remotely non-basic that you otherwise keep in your backpack.

ardy42 6y ago
> ... and which will never succeed again. That seems a little...overconfident. While some of the TSA stuff is definitely security theater that adds little value, not all of it is. > "Arbitrarily-prohibited" was a jab at everything else they've seen fit to condemn by extension, for example pliers. It's not just knives that you have to be concerned about, but anything remotely non-basic that you otherwise keep in your backpack. You can carry on pliers, just as long as they're less than 7 inches long: https://www.agefotostock.com/age/en/Stock-Images/Rights-Managed/G14-1968677 https://www.agefotostock.com/age/en/Stock-Images/Rights-Mana... https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/items/wrenchespliers https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/... The pair of pliers I have is 7.25 inches long. That rule seems quite reasonable to me. They do have a difficult task: write rules that can be executed quickly by relatively low-level employees to exclude items that could be used as a weapon or be a danger to the plane. I doubt that's even possible to do without creating corner cases that someone could gripe about.