Gringophobia
Dec. 1st, 2004 11:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
changelingAnd people ask me why I'm afraid to go to America. It used to be the mildly irrational fear of the fact that guns are legal there, and that I'm pretty damn sure your crime rate is higher than ours. Post September 11, it's your government I'm shit scared of. And don't tell me (not that I think there's anyone on my flist who would) that there's nothing to be afraid of if you're doing nothing wrong, because that's a fucking lie. You don't have to be guilty to be abused and humiliated, because it's all legal.
I really, really wish that the US relied more on the tourist dollar than they do, because maybe they'd cut this shit out when they discovered it was frightening us off.
I really, really wish that the US relied more on the tourist dollar than they do, because maybe they'd cut this shit out when they discovered it was frightening us off.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:24 am (UTC)The thing is, it probably isn't legal, at least in the way they did it. The problem is that most people don't realise that and are so intimidated that they accept it when the security officers tell them they have no recourse. One of the things I learned whilst working at Melbourne airport is that security officers lie through their teeth about the extent of their powers, using techniques similar to those police and met nazis often employ against young people.
Ironic much, no?
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 05:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 09:42 pm (UTC)Wow. That's a development I haven't heard about in any papers.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-02 01:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:47 am (UTC)I'm absolutely petrified of going there now. I'm sure it's nice and all...but seriously, as I posted before, only when stuff like that stops happening will I ever go there. On my list of things I am currently afraid of, 'being blown up on an aeroplane' is significantly lower than 'having my personal rights abused and ignored'.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:53 am (UTC)I read another bad one somewhere, a while back, about a man being held in detention for no good reason, and his pregnant wife being harrassed. She ended in tears. They tried to press charges, claiming he did all these things he didn't.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:57 am (UTC)It's all screwed up - it's so wrong - this is stuff that happens when you get wrongfully accused of drug smuggling in singapore or something. Not when you cry at airports. Everyone cries at airports. It's a place you cry at.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 05:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 05:44 am (UTC)Hm, there's that too. ARGH! THAT MAKES ME ANGRIER!
Because I couldn't get more aggravated today. This makes me kick random things. *despair*
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 06:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 04:58 am (UTC)I read what selkie wrote (hey, I should add her, she lives like 15 minutes from me-- is she cool?) and there are horror stories like that, but we aren't all assholes. I know that's hard to believe, especially now. And really, if you're from an ENglish speaking country, you're good...
I have been ashamed of being American since I was 10 years old-- so I'm not one of these flag waving gringos. I'm very sensitive to how we appear in the world, and I am ultra ashamed now.
But I have to say as much as I hate the government, and the people who support it, I do like our country-- there are beautiful parts of the United States that are worth seeing. Guns being legal, and being afraid of being harrassed at the airport is not a reason to stay away.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 05:51 am (UTC)I hear there are great and brilliant things in America!
(I just can't go there now. I've heard too many stories. And maybe thy're just isolated stories, and not true reflections of reality. But still...I refuse to go in protest. After the madness ends, I'm visiting Boston, yay!) In other news - that was a greatly long and completely un-needed bracketed sequence. *stares in horror at it*
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 06:16 am (UTC)I'm not afraid of being "harrassed". I'm afraid of being kept without charge, sexually assaulted or deported. I'm perfectly happy to wait a few years for the wind to change and for your country to start being sane again.
And I don't have the money to visit anyway, so it's a moot point.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 06:27 am (UTC)So are some of us. I guess that is what I am trying to say :-|
An American friend helped me dig up this checklist.
Date: 2004-12-01 06:58 am (UTC)The actual guidelines are here - it's flagrantly illegal. The furthest they can do is a manual examination - a patdown in a private room.
That's wrong. Get the word out. I'm going to alert the other friends on my list who know about this.
I've posted this to two others who know Selkie better. Hopefully they'll get the word out.
- Mel
Re: An American friend helped me dig up this checklist.
Date: 2004-12-01 08:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 09:40 pm (UTC)403 Forbidden.
What's going on, please?
no subject
Date: 2004-12-02 01:13 am (UTC)...checked the journal. Yep. She's locked it. Sounds like people were abusing her.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-02 03:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-02 05:26 pm (UTC)