This weekend, I was reading an article about the TSA in Alaska. Since I am frequently traveling, the article caught my eye. There was really nothing new to report, but in the article, Corky Caldwell, federal security director for several Alaska airports, repeated a commonly stated fallacy. He said that the random pat downs and more intensive and intrusive security checks are "going to be the price of freedom".
No, they are not. Granting government more power to search through all your belongings is not the price of freedom. We as individuals and citizens do not give up our rights to be free. We 'give up' our rights to be supposedly secure. This topic can get quite complicated quite quickly, but I will attempt to summarize.
Each individual, through ownership of our persons and the resulting results of our labors and actions, possesses certain rights. (I realize that this argument is based upon a great many presuppositions which I do not intend to elaborate upon right now. I am a l(L)ibertarian, so if you disagree with that philosophy, you'll disagree with me. Deal with it.) I am free when I live under a political system in which government respects and protects those rights without additional, arbitrary laws not designed to directly prevent one person from using force or fraud against another (which would be a violation of those same rights in others). The more laws I am ordered to obey that do not directly relate to those principles, the less free I am. So, a law against murder does not impinge upon my freedom because I do not have the 'freedom' to murder anyway. (This is not to be confused with justifiable homicide, such as self-defense.) Protection from the actions of individuals is called security. The protection of my rights by a government (or other voluntary enforcement) protects not my freedom but my security.
Ah, you say, TSA makes sure that people do not get on the airplane with weapons. Thus, they prevent people from using force or fraud against you, Alaskalawyer. As such, those laws promote security. No, they do not. The ownership of my own body not only permits but demands that I protect it. Governmental interference in my ability to adequately protect myself forcibly transfers my right and duty to protect myself to the government. As such, such laws make me less free because those laws do not directly prevent one person from using force or fraud against another. They do, however, diminish individual capacity to defend against aggression. Thus, those laws make me, and other airline travelers, less free.
There are a number of ways in which airlines (rather than the government) could deal with security issues in a way that would not diminish individual freedom and also protect their passengers. I do not mean my argument to be read to reject any idea of sensible business practices designed to diminish the risk of terrorist attacks and violent incidents. I also do not realistically expect the TSA to be disbanded any time in the near future (or to see any major advancements in human freedom in the US). Nonetheless, I would like to see this abuse of the word freedom corrected. And while I also do not expect to see that happen anytime soon, either, after having said my peace, I feel better.
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