Your favorite author: once again in the long queue, winding around the barriers, frantically stripping off belt, emptying pockets, dragging computer out of wherever he’d stuffed it, working out the ziploc bag full of tiny bottles of assorted liquids and gels (omigod, did I forget the toothpaste?) trying not to lose track of passport, boarding pass, and money, meanwhile inching along and urging the bags forward, around, back and forth, amongst conversations in English, French, Mandarin, Korean, German, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, Hindi, crying infants, somber-faced uniformed guards…

Where is he? Is this some Dantean afterlife purgatorial scenario? A nightmare maybe? No, just the usual annoying and humiliating airport security checks. Does this serve any purpose other than to piss people off? What’s the point?

A gesture from the Government? “Don’t worry, people, we got those nasty terrorists under control!”

Hmm… no one can stop any but the dumbest hijacker with security checks. Any seasoned prison inmate could whip up a deadly weapon that security checks couldn’t catch in a few minutes with whatever’s handy. Probably could invent five without stopping to think. But I won’t mention any… Well, ok. Our forebears managed quite well to slice up animals and probably each other with sharpened rocks for the trivial timespan of two million years or so. Shhhh – don’t tell anybody!

Next Most Wanted Criminal: Obama Bin Flintstone, known to have hijacked a mammoth.

The intent, not the tool, makes a terrorist, and scanning machines don’t detect intent. You don’t even need a tool. A former special forces commando who served in the Vietnam war, used to brag that he knew 21 ways to kill a man with one finger. When he left the service, they required him to register his hands as deadly weapons! “Ok, nobody move. I got a finger here!”

Laudably, some government agents have uncovered terrorist plots before the actors could commit them. But how far in that direction can you go in a supposed republic? Continual surveillance of all citizens in the name of security? Thought reading machines? (In development.)

“Fools do those villains pity who are punished
Ere they have done their mischief.”

An honorable sentiment but where do you draw the line? (Note that in King Lear a villain – Goneril – said this.) Laws already punish people for the ambiguous felony of “conspiring” (see 18 USC § 371), so one can easily imagine an extension of these laws to thinking about committing a crime… Never too soon to start taking thought control classes!

Coming soon to an airport near you! Thought Scanner ™. Don’t worry! If you have no criminal thoughts, you have nothing to fear!

***

A show of power? A statement that the DHS and equivalent authorities wield ultimate power over you?

Orwell stated it well, in 1984: How does one man demonstrate his power over another? By making him suffer. If he’s not suffering, how do you know he’s following your will and not his own?

Security checks at airports mirror those prison guards subject inmates to: they have the right to minutely inspect your body and possessions and confiscate anything not allowed by their arbitrary rules. The first thing guards make prisoners do is strip. Of course in airports they strip people using high technology – you don’t actually have to take your clothes off as the machines can see through them. Faster that way.

***

Then in a blinding flash the real purpose of the security checks struck me: a ritual. Every culture has its rituals, which often seem bizarre and unnecessary to outsiders. For example, the custom of making teenage girls wear short skirts and do a sexy dance before the community while the boys, clad in padded clothes, bash into each other’s bodies (North America.) Or the Greek custom of smashing plates and glasses in restaurants. The ritual of walking over hot coals.

So the emerging culture of Globaltech develops rituals, especially before its most sacred magical ceremony: Teleportation. We’re talking Real Magic here: you enter the hallowed silver cave and emerge a few hours later in a completely different place, anywhere on the planet Globaltech has set up its magical teleportation centers.

To prepare to take part in this awesome ceremony, in which Powerful Hi-Tech levitates you into Heaven (“heaven” means “sky”), you have to strip (at least partially) and pass through the Magical Machine, which detects the least impurity or flaw in your faith. Remove your jacket, belt, hat, jewelry, even sometimes shoes, and everything in your pockets. Stand in the gateway and assume the prescribed position.

You, and all your possessions, must be purified by the Sacred Fire of the Mystical Electronic Scanner, and sanctioned by the Priests of Security. When the Guardian of the Sacred Scanner deems it necessary, the penitent not perfect, they perform the Laying On of Hands (patting down.) The God of High Technology demands you appear naked before him, with the correct humble attitude.

After this test of your devotion, the Guardians admit you to the Temple where only the Spiritually Cleansed may enter. You have passed the Trial by Electronic Fire.

Hastily gathering your newly blessed possessions, tying on your belt and refilling your pockets, you then must transit the mysterious maze of Duty Free Shops, paying your dues to the Church of Capitalism and receiving an approved token to keep you safe during the ordeal of the ceremony.

Finally appears the Gate. Purified, clutching close your bottle of holy water, Johnny Walker or Gordon’s (“Whiskey” means “Water of Life”), and your Holy Smokes, Marlboro or Dunhills – with awe and reverence you approach the final altar, present your sanction, and receive the Blessing of the Acolyte. You step carefully through the tunnel and enter the Holy of Holies, the Great Silver Bird, the actual living heart of Globaltech tradition and power, the Inner Sanctum where the Magic Manifests.

In the unseen inner cave the High Priest, the Pilot, in his ceremonial garb, sits surrounded by awe-inspiring levers, knobs, screens and gauges. He issues reassuring oracular pronouncements over the intercom before and during the teleportation. You never see this mysterious creature, you only hear his voice.

Like all magic, teleportation also harbors some dangers. Before Levitation commences, the Acolytes in their ceremonial vestments, intone the traditional prayers while performing the ritual movements: magical words like “Seat Belts,” “Life Jackets,” and “Emergency Exits” exorcise the demons of “Unlikely event of water landing” and other evil spirits. Just as in churches, the sacred text may also be found in front of each seat in the pews.

So, fellow devotee of Globaltech Magic. Next time you have to pass through the security checks at an airport, don’t feel angry and frustrated. Observe it as an anthropologist would any arcane cultural ritual.