Apr 03 2008
New airline check-in questions
About a month ago I started noticing some new airline check-in questions. They used to ask fairly intuitive questions: Are these your bags? Have you had them with you at all times? Have you been asked to carry packages from unknown individuals? Now they ask new, dumb questions. The most absurd to me is: Are you carrying any explosives?
Am I carrying explosives? Seriously?
Why don’t we just ask: Are you a terrorist? I’ll tell you why we don’t ask that; it would be dumb. Nobody would answer honestly. This of course begs the questions, who would honestly answer that, yes, they do in fact have explosives in their bags. Nobody. Obviously. So, to give them the benefit of the doubt, I’ve come up with a list of other possible reasons they may be asking if you packed explosives in your luggage this morning:
- You may have accidentally packed a pipe bomb. Hey, it happens, and not as rarely as you think. You’re tired, maybe it’s early in the morning, or you’re rushed, and you think to yourself: Toothbrush, check, belt, check, ticket, check, underwear, check (better bring a spare pair, just in case), and pipe bomb, check. When you go to check in, oooops! You’re right, I did accidentally bring a pipe bomb. Here, why don’t you just throw this away for me. And while you’re at it, here is the nail file I accidentally brought, which you’re bound to confiscate from me anyway, lest I manicure the pilots to death.
- As a courtesy to our travelers: Did you remember to bring a pipe bomb? We have spares here, which we give as a courtesy along with 1 quart plastic Ziplock bags.
- To catch you off guard. You know the routine, you’re a terrorist, you’ve been practicing answering the questions all morning: “yes, these are my bags, no I haven’t accepted a package from an unknown individual… yes, these are my bags, no I haven’t accepted a package from unknown individuals.” “Hello Mr. Al-Qaida, are you bringing any explosives with you today?” “Yes these are my bags… oh, uh… yeah, I have a bomb. Oh shit! I mean, no! No, I don’t have a bomb!”
- To reassure our passengers. Don’t worry Mr. Smith, you’ll be safe flying with us. We ask every passenger if they’re bringing explosives, and every passenger on your flight has said “no” so far. Thanks for flying the Friendly Skies!
- Conspiracy theory: because the government doesn’t think we’re smart enough to realize what a ridiculous attempt this is to create paranoia and put enough fear into the public to continue to pump billions and billions of dollars a year into illegal wire-tapping programs on innocent sovereign citizens by insisting against all evidence that there is an imminent threat against our Multi-Trillion-Dollar-Per-Year Military by a group of cave-dwelling camel jockeys.
So, um, no. I don’t have any explosives in my luggage. I’m glad we could clear this up.
You forgot reverse reverse psychology.
You should change it up next time & say “yes, I do” just to see what their reaction is.
If you get busted, you can always follow up with “… ohhhhhh, I totally thought you said “cell phone” and I have one of those, but no explosives.”