Live Q&A With Ex-TSA Agent Jason Harrington

Jason Harrington (@Jas0nHarringt0n) is a controversial blogger, frequent contributor to McSweeney's Internet Tendency, and one of the TSA's least favorite ex-employees. His descriptions of life on the job as a TSA agent caused some big waves and restarted a national discussion on security theater. Jason will be answering your questions below for the next couple of hours, or until the security line starts moving again. Please keep it to one question per post so everyone gets a chance. Update: 03/01 02:11 GMT by S : Jason has finished up for now — you can skip to his answers at his user page, or simply browse the comments to read everything. Thanks Jason for answering our questions!

Re:Messaging from higher ups?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Sometimes they would decide that they wanted to make sure no TSA officers in the entire airport were chewing gum at any time while on duty.

Obviously, someone higher up associated chewing gum with plastic explosives... ;-)

Re:Opt-outs

[JHarrington]

Generally, opt-outs are looked at as an annoyance. If the checkpoint isn't busy, then the agents might not mind doing your pat-down at all. If they're bored, they may even welcome the diversion. But if a checkpoint's getting slammed, and TSA screeners are having a bad day in general, and then you show up opting out, they might be either aggravated with you, at times disdainful. I had one former co-worker who used to shape his hands into a diamond shape every time an opt-out came through. I asked him what it was supposed to mean. A vagina, he explained.