A word of warning for us...


sorabji.com: Surfwatch: A word of warning for us...
By Antigone on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 01:52 am:


By Platypus on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 02:13 am:

    Has anyone ever sent for their file under the FOIA? I have an FBI red flag, so I did just out of curiosity. The results were...interesting, to say the least. I recommend that everyone do it.

    And yes, having a red flag is a huge pain in the ass every time you fly. Those TSA people seriously have NO sense of humour.

    More interesting is that someone from her journalling community reported her. Trust no one, man. Jesus.


By D on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 03:30 am:

    1984 did turned my lives upside down.


By semillama on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 10:28 am:

    yeah. fucking ridiculous. I read about this on another board, and apparently the "percieved threat" involved a "spork".

    So, keep that in mind, that the Secret Service considers a spork a potential deadly weapon.


By Antigone on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 02:07 pm:

    Platy, how do you know if you've got a red flag?

    And, WTF? You've got to spill about yours. :P


By Platypus on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 03:29 pm:

    Antigone--the way I found out was that every time I flew (and this was before 11 Sept, mind you), I was getting pulled and searched, along with all my baggage. I finally asked a nice airline lady what was up, and she told me "your account is flagged." And I said "what, with the airline?" And she said "no, you know, with...them." "Who?" And then, in a very small voice: "the FBI." "Really? Why?"

    So the long and short of it was that she didn't know. So I wrote for my file, because I was kind of curious (it fucks with your flying mojo, job mojo, etc etc). And my file was very unenlightening.

    So it could be because I was out and about at several protests (WTO, RNC, DNC, Genoa, G8, etc). It might be because I'm a midget. Maybe it's because of my ubderspy grandparents. I don't really know. I could appeal it if I knew what it was for...

    But it makes flying these days really entertaining. Because they aren't nearly so subtle anymore. Usually I end up with a whole row of seats to myself because no one wants to sit "with the terrorist."

    The secret service and the fbi get upset about very wierd things. Sporks, apparently, among them. We used to have these wierd metal spork things when I was a kid. Now those could do some damage. Maybe that's what the secret service was thinking of? Sporking tires?


By semillama. on Friday, October 29, 2004 - 04:26 pm:

    No, I believe it was faces, what I heard.


By D on Saturday, October 30, 2004 - 02:36 am:

    Uhmm... excuse me, "Spork" ? Dr Spock? hee hahah ho!