Fall break is quickly approaching; Thanksgiving is not too far away; and Christmas vacation is nearing at an alarming rate. Pomona students, Americans, and the rest of the world will be flooding airports similarly, though perhaps in slightly fewer numbers, to how they have each and every year around this season. Yet, we all know that there will be something a bit different–a bit bleaker and more worrisome–about these flights for many of us. The thoughts of September 11 are causing many people to pause before making their holiday travel plans, and with good reason–to many, it’s no longer safe to fly American skies.

Lucky for us, I suppose, that the United States Legislature and the Federal Aviation Administration are here to enact new rules and regulations to prevent such terrorism from ever happening again. No longer are knives and cutting instruments, except for nail clippers and safety razors, allowed to be carried on board. Why aren’t mechanical pencils on that list? And passengers are now limited to one carry-on bag and one personal article (i.e. purse of briefcase) when entering a plane, to allow for better, more efficient screening of both bags and passengers. What of the checked-in baggage that lie in the belly of the very planes we fly in? The FAA states that the number of checked in bags that are screened has increased since the September 11 terrorist attack? Increased? Did we learn nothing from Pan Am Flight 103–a flight which exploded in 1988 over Lockerbie, Scotland due to a bomb concealed in the unscreened checked-in baggage? Not screening checked baggage cost the lives of all 259 people on board and 11 people on the ground.

But the FAA must have an effective way to decide which checked bags are and are not to be screened–mustn’t it? It does, in the form of CAPPS, the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-Screening System, a profiling program used to distinguish passengers who pose no threat to safety from those who might. Based upon statistics from previous hijackings, CAPPS was evidently unable to prevent the events of September 11, as terrorists actually drastically change their modus operandi from times past. Triggered whenever a customer purchases a ticket on a major U.S. carrier, CAPPS gives each passenger a numerical score based on such information as the date, methods, and characteristics of their aviation purchases. If customers score above a certain level, only then are their checked bags subject to CAT scans and their person to pat downs or questionings. Recently many concerned travelers are asking why race, religion, and national origin do not make the list of suspect characteristics. In the cases of Vahid Zohrehvandi, a Dallas software developer, and Ashraf Khan, a San Antonio businessman, such racial profiling was not far from a reality. Both men were asked to get of the plane they were set to travel on for reasons like, "the pilot does not feel comfortable flying," and "the pilot does not like how you look."

Doesn’t anyone get it? All bets are off. All assumptions, invalid. It was our preconceptions that allowed this to happen in the first place. We’ve always believed terrorists would use a plane as a bargaining chip, and look where the assumption that terrorists are not willing to sacrifice themselves brought us. We were looking for people with guns or bombs, so the terrorists brought box-cutters and razor blades. We were on the watch for people who avoided regulations, so the 19 hijackers conformed to every ID, ticket, checkpoint and rule in the book. It then makes sense that if we profile every person of a certain race, appearance, gender or creed, terrorists will just use someone different–someone seemingly innocent.

Assumptions and stereotypes are one of the few things flying quickly throughout the U.S. and around the world. If we abide by them, we’re just setting ourselves up to be outsmarted again. The regulations present before September 11 don’t need to be intensified, they need to be revamped. Airlines are feeding us a false sense of security, meanwhile prioritizing cost-efficiency and timetables above all else. Similar measures have cost the lives of our loved ones and are now compromising the civil liberties of innocent people–I think we have to wonder when flying these next few months, are all the security measures and personal intrusions making us feel safer than we are?

Sincerely,

Amit Thakkar

Editor-in-Chief