August 17, 2011

TSA - Another Pat Down? What the What?


WWTD - How would this group of women have handled this?
This is the kind of thing that had me nervous on my trip to Hawaii last week.  I had to board several different flights and go through numerous security checks and I immediately thought of the first incident back in July that sent the natural hair community into a frenzy, and rightfully so.  As I traveled back home, I had my hair in a high bun on top of my head thinking, “please don’t let me be the next black woman to have her coif patted down.  Well turns out, this woman was the second.  I found this article on the Atlanta Post. 
Timery Shante Nance is an African-American woman who has a thing about her hair. “I don’t use chemicals or straighteners,” she said. “It’s just my natural texture, and I wear it in a normal-looking puff.” Now she wonders, as some other black women evidently do, whether the Transportation Security Administration also has a thing about their hair. Ms. Nance is the second black woman I’m aware of within a month who says she was racially profiled when a T.S.A. officer insisted on publicly patting down her hair after she had already gone though a full-body scan without setting off any alarm. Ms. Nance was departing from the airport in San Antonio in late July. After she passed through the body scanner, she said, a female T.S.A. screener told her to stand facing her possessions. “You’re good to go, but first I have to pat your hair,” the officer told her, she said.
Click here for rest of the article.

2 comments:

Cocoa Curlz said...

I am very nervous to fly again. I am hoping that with bringing awareness this practice can be stopped.

Curly Chic said...

@Cocoa Curlz - I certainly hope so.I was so paranoid!