Monthly Archives: August 2003

I have the pleasure of serving with John Gillmore on EFF’s board. While there are many things we disagree about, we share many values, and this one in particular: At a time of terror, we should demand reasonableness of those with authority � even more strongly than in times of peace. I view BA’s behavior here to be unreasonable. I don’t doubt they have the “right” to do what they did — such is the nature of law in a time of terror. That’s not, in my view, the point. They have the responsibility to behave reasonably in the face of possible threats. Gillmore’s behavior was not a threat. If it was a threat, removing the button would not have eliminated the threat. Demanding he remove the button as a condition of flying therefore serves no good end, except the end of showing who’s in charge. Reason, not power, should be in charge always, but especially now. Continue reading →

John has sent me the following response to the comments on the post about his BA experience. I have posted my view here.

From John Gilmore:

It’s been interesting reading. I’d like to respond. I suppose the obvious place to start is with Seth Finkelstein’s trolls. (Of course he is doing what he accuses me of — making outrageous statements and then chuckling when people take them seriously).

I flew to London on Virgin Atlantic two days after the BA incident. I am happy to report that I wore the button, and that neither their passengers, cabin stewards, nor pilots were hysterical. I wore the button in London. I crossed the Channel where the crew gave the shorted possible glance at my passport. I wore it yesterday in Paris.

The button is not a joke. It’s a serious statement which one may agree or disagree with. The point that people seem to be missing is that a “suspected terrorist” is not the same as a “terrorist”. Yet, that’s exactly the conflation that has occurred: treat every citizen like a suspect, and every suspect like a terrorist.

In London and Paris the newspapers are taking Guantanamo seriously — because their own citizens are imprisoned there without trials. The corrupt US government was careful to remove the one US citizen they found — but the citizens of other sovereign countries, even those of very close war allies, are in prison. Without trial and without lawyers, and with intent to try them in front of judges sworn to take orders from the President. I have no doubt that American citizens, such as myself, would be treated in the same way if the public and the courts would let our fascist leader get away with it.

On the BA flight, in my carry-on bag, I had brought the current issue of Reason magazine, which has a cover story with my picture and the label “Suspected Terrorist”. (It didn’t even occur to me to censor my reading material on the flight; I must need political retraining. I hadn’t read most of the issue, including Declan’s piece in it, plus I wanted to show it to Europeans I met on my vacation.) During the British Airways incident I never removed the magazine from my bag, but supposing I had done so, and merely sat in my seat and read it, would that have been grounds to remove me from the flight (button or no button)?

I am not a lawyer (lucky me!) but I do follow legal issues. The carriage of passengers by common carriers is governed by their tariffs, filed with the government. Common carriers are NOT permitted to refuse service to anybody for any reason. In return they are not held liable for the acts of their customers (e.g. transporting dangerous substances, purloined intellectual property, etc). BA’s “Conditions of Carriage” are part of their tariffs (other parts include their prices, etc). You will note paragraph 7: they can refuse passage…7) If you have not obeyed the instructions of our ground staff or a member of the crew of the aircraft relating to safety or security. The crew ONLY has the authority to order passengers around when the orders relate to safety or security. An order to cease reading a book would not qualify.

Some people here (including Mr. Troll) think that the minor risk that someone on the plane will have a panic attack after reading a tiny button, makes the button a “safety” issue, as if I had falsely cried “fire” and risked starting a stampede. Such people seem to be holding me responsible for the actions of others. Were I on such a plane, whether or not I was wearing a button, the person I’d ask them to remove is the one having a panic attack, not the one sitting quietly in their seat.

(Similarly, some people hold me responsible for the inconvenience to passengers. As Virgin Atlantic demonstrated, the airline were in complete control of whether or not to inconvenience the passengers.)

Let me also say in my defense that I seldom fly these days, so I am not used to life in a gulag. I had zero expectation that my refusal to doff a button would result in the captain returning the plane to the gate. But even if I did fly often, my response would be the same: to constantly push back against the rules that turn a free people into the slaves of a totalitarian regime. I push back using the rights granted me by the constitutional structure of the country, plus my own intelligence and resources. Way too many of you readers are like the Poles who, under orders from swaggering bullies, built the brick wall around their own ghetto, as shown in the award-winning movie “The Pianist” (which I watched on the Virgin Atlantic flight). The US is currently filling the swaggering bully role at home, in Iraq, and in the rest of the world. (Come out to free countries and ask around, if you disagree.)

Here are some interesting incidents relating to these issues:

• Dr. Bob Rajcoomar gets a settlement and formal apology from TSA — only after suing with help from ACLU. Dr. Rajcoomar, a U.S. citizen and Lt. Colonel in the United States Army Reserve, is of Indian descent. After an in-flight incident involving an unruly passenger, Air marshals handcuffed Dr. Rajcoomar without explanation and took him into the custody of Philadelphia police. His wife Dorothy, who was also on the flight, was given no information on what had happened to her husband. Because the authorities confiscated Dr. Rajcoomar’s cellular phone, she had no way to contact him. After four hours of detention, TSA personnel told him that he had been detained because air marshals on board the flight did not “like the way he looked.” The agency’s official explanation for Dr. Rajcoomar’s treatment is that while on board, Dr. Rajcoomar had been observing the actions of the air marshals “too closely”!
• ACLU sues four airlines over ejecting passengers because of their race. Subsequent news in these lawsuits is that at least three of them have survived the airlines’ “motion to dismiss”, i.e. the court thinks there is a real injury to these peoples’ rights.
• Passenger detained for speaking with journalist about a NASA nuclear rocket project, while waiting for his airplane.
• TSA’s CAPPS 2 will track every passenger by their date of birth, home address, home phone, and full name — and stop or search anyone based on secret criteria. The TSA’s August 1 announcement makes every airport a “law enforcement checkpoint” which you cannot pass through without having your “papers in order”.
• TSA publishes rules demanding ID on passenger boats. (TSA and cruise lines have already been requiring these IDs, but under unpublished regulations. Ditto for Amtrak trains and long-haul bus lines.)

Above, Floyd McWilliams posted a perfect example of what’s wrong with this debate:

Gilmore is insulted by being labeled a “suspected terrorist.” Okay, but then how would an airline figure out that he’s a peaceable fellow except by, well, identifying him? Did he expect to be labeled a low security risk because he wasn’t swarthy?

No. I expected to be treated as peaceable because I had not breached the peace. I expected to be treated as innocent because I was not guilty of any crime. Continue reading →