Pixiq

Carlos, you ARE a terrorist simply because you openly mock law enforcement. At least that’s the way THEY see it.

Since the government has the ability to classify anyone it wants as a terrorist at any time, the fact that you have not been classified as a terrorist sympathizer (yet) by the government is only a matter of either their laziness, ineptness or expediency.

This administration, more than any other sees any dissent whatsoever as being a threat.

Of course they can’t fathom that dissent against an over-reaching government is not the same as terrorism or anti-patriotism.

It’s not the security of the United States they’re worried about, it’s the security of the government apparatus and it’s unchecked ability to grow and control us that they are concerned about.
Difster recently posted..Lessons From Mexico

Some terrorist I’ll be. I advocate cameras over guns (although I am a gun owner).
Carlos Miller recently posted..TSA publishes new posters depicting photographers as terrorists

“This administration, more than any other sees any dissent whatsoever as being a threat.”

I didn’t realize Bush was still in office. Thanks for setting the record straight!

*eyeroll* So aircraft spotters are the new bad guys?

I think it’s the cowboy boots that really scream terrorist. The TSA posters would make sense if they showed a guy duplicating a pilots ID at Kinkos or something. Something that’s more likely to happen … and makes more sense with the tag line. Wrong hands and all that.

Don’t these terrorists have warm cars in which they can sit in? Parked in the countless parking lots surrounding airports with their 800mm lenses? You know, out of sight and all terroristy like? Somewhere where they won’t get noticed by citizen sparky with a cell phone? Why are the terrorists so bad at doing this shit?

What about the guy taking the picture of the guy taking the picture? Is he a terrorist as well? Oh, the TSA is getting into rabbit hole territory with this.

At least you’re in good company, Carlos:

- In an April 7, 2009 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) “declassified” report on the “Top Threats” to American security titled, Rightwing Extremism, DHS explains how our nation’s Founding Fathers would have certainly qualified for Obama’s definition of “domestic terrorists” and “rightwing extremists.” -
http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/10231

I may not be a photographer myself, but I recognize that the core priciple of your work here is to expose abuses of freedom (most which are against photographers engaged in exercising related rights).

Sure seems as though the gov treats any advocate of freedom as a “terrorist” and dire threat. Hm.

Oh, by the bye, my above post wasn’t a bash on Obama specifically. Obama is just continuing the longstanding tradition of the federal government usurping powers just as it did under Bush Jr, Clinton, Bush Sr, Reagan, Carter, etc.

State and local governments have been following the example of their Big Bro, of course, and have been for a long while.

Guy, it’s kind of strange you would bring that report up, given that it was in fact followed by a surge in right wing violence and domestic terrorism.

I’m not a fan of the security state that’s developed in the last decade, but I’m also not a fan of people who want to blow up government buildings, lynch gay people, shoot doctors, attempt to assassinate the president, and who vandalize houses of worship because the people who pray there happen to call God by the name Allah.

Your comment might have had some merit if you’d cited the absurd examples of the FBI spying on peace activists and Quakers, but instead you for some reason beyond my comprehension dredge a report on groups who have actually engaged in a pattern of violent behavior, and who seem to be stepping things up a notch.

My question for you is this: Did you even care when the FBI was harassing peace activists? Or did you only get mad when it was your racist, homophobic, viscous and violent teabagger buddies were in the state’s cross-hairs?

goldfish, why don’t you tell me what I did “when the FBI was harassing peace activists” since you seem to know me so well.

(I’m not a fan of vapid emotional arguments without any logical or factual basis whatsoever.)

While you’re telling me more about myself, you could also share your data points in the “surge in right wing violence and domestic terrorism” after April 7th, 2009, then baseline it against the other random crime as well as the occasional eco-nutball-terrorists who take hostages in Discovery Channel offices (oh, wait, there was just the one guy who did that).

MY POINT was that the government treats advocates of most/all flavors of freedom as enemies, and has done so for a long time. Did you perhaps miss my references to the governments under the Bushes and Reagan?

Maybe we should all sue for defamation…

Also, on the poster: “If you question it, report it”; since I question the poster itself, should I report each one?

Bryan, you took the words out of my mouth! If rapper Eminem’s mother can sue him for saying she was a drug addict, photographers ought to sue for saying we’re terrorists!

Almost time for the mother of all class action lawsuits…

everytime I see something like this I make a point to photograph a government building, just because.

I’m willing to go to jail to protect my rights to photograph in public, even if I’m wearing a hoodie.

Nice to see another Jankowski on here Tom! =O)

“I didn’t realize Bush was still in office. Thanks for setting the record straight!”

Administrations and parties change, but corporatism and the military industrial complex grow inexorably stronger.

I’m sure he was lumping Bush III, I mean Obama, into the administration of Bush II.

Maybe the class action lawsuit idea has some merit. If not a lawsuit (which might be frivolous), maybe we should send a letter from all of us to TSA and ask them to quit their idiotic depiction of photographers as terrorists and vice versa. If we start raising our voice directly instead of just blowing off steam on here, maybe we’d be heard.
Peter Greene recently posted..Lake Oswego Chefs Grow and Gather Dinnerjpg by Peter Greene

How about a reality show where we travel around the country standing outside the fences of airports wearing hoodies and taking photos?

We’ll have enough material for at least one season.

You’d have enough material for 10 seasons easily. Maybe a webcast?

Apparently they’ve never heard of Airliners.net where people will spend HOURS taking pictures of planes in order to get one picture accepted and displayed. There are thousands of people who enjoy shooting planes (as well as trains). How do you distinguish a hobbyist from a terrorist shooting on final approach?

Guess this eliminates (temporarly) my idea of finding that nice road I flew over every time i landed to get some nice Landing shots of Aircraft..

and what of the Avaiation photography industry? I guess they’ll all have pack up and get new jobs, since they’re all terrorists now.. what with photographing planes not only landing / taking off, but IN the AIR, with ANOTHER PLANE *OMG*

Or maybe a National Airport Photo Day where we organize groups in cities and towns across the country and we all go at it at the same time?

I bet we’d kick up enough dust to make it a national news story.
Peter Greene recently posted..Lake Oswego Chefs Grow and Gather Dinnerjpg by Peter Greene

I regularly go out to the local small airport and snap pics of airplanes (when I’m not flying myself), evening walking out on the ramp from the terminal building to take pics, and nobody bats an eye.

Ive got to Memphis International with friends and snapped pics right beside the airport fence and the airport cops have just waved as they drove by.

This kind of bile spewing out of the TSA is only going to make people hostile towards enthusiasts like me. Not everyone who is interested in planes can whip out a pilots license and somewhat redeem themselves in the eyes of these thugs.

Pilot MKN……the overzealous won’t care if you have a pilots license. Didn’t Mohamed Atta have a pilots license?? With an instrument rating, no less!
Peter Greene recently posted..Lake Oswego Chefs Grow and Gather Dinnerjpg by Peter Greene

“I didn’t realize Bush was still in office. Thanks for setting the record straight!”

Meet the new boss, worse than the old boss.

(With apologies to The Who)

Carlos, I just don’t see the show as being interesting if it’s just taking pictures at airports. OTOH, glad you brought this all to my attention; it is of course ridiculous to brand all photographers as terrorists. That makes me wonder if they are just trying to justify their jobs or if they are acting on specific information?

/..

I was at KOA a few months back and some TSA guard told me not to take pictures of a 767 that had just taxied to the “gate” with my uncle aboard. I was really like WTF.

Because when terrorists have photos of airplanes, they’ll then know what one looks like. Once they know what a plane looks like we’re doomed. Next thing you know, they’ll be taking piloting lessons and booking flights. It’s such a fantastic idea to deprive them of photos of airplanes. I feel sooooo much safer now. (as long as the baggage monkey doesn’t place a bomb in my luggage when he steals my camera)

Hey, the TSA has to look like it’s doing something, or it’s just not proper security theater.

Besides, if they went after actual terrorists and other dangerous people, they might get hurt or something.
Michaelk42 recently posted..Unsurprisingly- Pogan gets no real punishment

And AGAIN;

Or as Schneier put it so well in If you see something, Say something -

“And, as I’ve written previously, ‘if you ask amateurs to act as front-line security personnel, you shouldn’t be surprised when you get amateur security.’ People don’t need to be reminded to call the police; the slogan is nothing more than an invitation to report people who are different.”
Michaelk42 recently posted..Unsurprisingly- Pogan gets no real punishment

I’m a Quaker, and if I was also working for the FBI, you can BE SURE I’d be watching me. I’d follow myself every time I went to the bathroom, I’d sleep with myself, I’d keep track of all my friends and acquaintances, and I’d listen in to all my phone conversations.

Railfans have had the same problems as planefans.

Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, and the rest of them are all in the same class: the political class. The ones who think that the government needs to run society. The union members. The teachers. The bureaucrats. Unless the freedom class (which the other 2/3rds of us belong) stops cooperating, we’ll have less and less and less freedom as time goes on. Non-cooperation. It’s the only path to freedom.

Somebody tells you not to take photographs, and you’re on public property, you just say “Thanks for your advice.” If they’re LEO, they might try to arrest you. Ask them “Am I under arrest?” If they answer yes, then cooperate. If they’re not arresting you, then you’re free to keep taking photographs. “Thanks for your advice” is all you need to say to them.

(I’m not a lawyer; this isn’t legal advice. It is the truth as far as I know it.)
Russell Nelson recently posted..Unions vs Globalization

I saw on the news today that a stuffed toy was blown up by police on suspicion it might have been a bomb.

Is there no limit to the hysterical, illogical, and paranoid police ‘anti-terrorism’ nonsense?

Terrorist need not expend energy themselves, we have enough home grown loony-tunes law enforcement believing there is a bomb in every objec tthat’s not being held in a human hand that they don’t have to.

dear TSA

airliners.net al qaeda

k?tnxbai

Tsa is a bunch of former FAA, airline ramp workers and corrupted former police who together create this fasade of security. This agency does not provide security. It’s curtains and smoke. Someone should go to jfk to investigate the corruption.

Only in America. Come to Japan’s Airports where you’ll see hundreds of us aviation photographers snapping airplanes on a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

I guess it is time for a photowalk at the SLC International Airport. Photography is not a crime. The real criminals get elected.
Tom Sparks recently posted..Olivia M

Read the smaller print on the poster:
“If you question it, report it”

It does not say the guy has no right to take pictures. It does say he might be suspicious, and thus one should contact the authorities who can investigate and either vet the photographer or carry his sorry terrorist ass off to jail.

Paul, being labelled ‘suspicious’ for engaging in a legal activity means the security folks are taking the easy way out and just broadly categorizing people for a lame reason.

In other situations it is called that ‘profiling’ and other, more specific variations on the theme, ‘racism.’

And it all really comes down to who in their ‘right terrorist mind’ would be so obvious as to case an intended target in that way? A quick drive by with a cellphone camera, carrying a covert pinhole camera, or just Googling gives them all the information and no one is the wiser.

It’s trite but true that if we are reduced to being treated as suspicious for going about our daily routine (wasn’t what the government asked us to do after 9-11?) then the terrorists have realized a victory.

Guess the TSA forgot that LAX has two locations that are littlered with photographers snapping pics of incoming planes. One directly under the North runway across the street from In-N-Out Burgers on a patch of lawn. The other across the street from LAX in El Segundo on top of a hill looking down on the South runway. Where even cops sit and watch during their lunches. There are benches tables and even those stationary binoculars.

This is awful but does not surprise me of the TSA.

Pictures are worth a thousand words, and in this case, what’s *implied* by the photograph is far more powerful than whatever might be explicitly stated or unstated in the ad.

Photographers are targeted simply by virtue of the fact that others don’t understand *why* we would want to photograph something (planes, trains, children, strangers, whatever). That should not bring us under suspicion by default.

This is also more bureaucracy trying to justify it’s own existence and trying to extend it’s own authority.

I’m surprised they didn’t use the photo someone took of me standing on top of my Element w/ 70-200 shooting Rwy 9L landings @ FLL (although, as a pilot, if I saw myself, I’d probably abort the landing )

While all the attention is on the good guy the bad guy walks in the front door. Just another form of paranoia!
Brian Carey recently posted..Night Lights

Where were these supercops before 9/11 ? Efing clowns.

Could GoogleMaps and their StreetView (which I find extremely usefull in navigating my city) not be classified as complicit in aiding and abetting terrorism? They provide more detailed information about access to government buildings than any terrorist could ever hope to gather on their own. Perhaps Google needs investigating, rather than harassing amateur photographers taking interesting shots for their photo blogs. I just did a Google StreetView of YYZ, and there’s some pretty sensitive stuff visible there.
RobertB recently posted..Turmoil

What about the guy taking a picture of the guy taking a picture, maybe we should report him too.
johnjac recently posted..johnjac- Google Instant Press Conference summary You dont have to press enter

A photograph of a poster of someone taking a picture of a man snapping a shot of a plane. The terrorism runs deep. I think I might just take a picture of this page, print it out, and then post it on my wall, so all my other terrorist friends can come over and take pictures of it as well. I hope I don’t get caught.

For a photography blog, that sure is a poor-quality photograph of the offending sign. How am I supposed to shoop it for the lulz with that big hot spot/reflection on the poster?

By the way, see the related press release from TSA:
http://www.tsa.gov/press/releases/2010/0726.shtm
This program “will enable general aviation passengers and crew to better recognize and report behaviors and indicators associated with new and evolving threats . . . .”