Should books be banned on flights? (1 Viewer)

I've just been reading about the big incident yesterday (let's not go into debating that) and just found out they're banning books and newspapers from flights out of Great Britain...

sorry,

WTF!

Most of the other bans I can understand, especially considering the threat they were stopping. and since I'm not flying anywhere in the next three months, I'll just hope for the bottled water restriction to come down and hope that the electronics restriction doesn't infect US domestic flights.

But if you're going to take away all electronic entertainment you have to leave people something to read. Those in-flight magazines are much more dangerous weapons because I actually think they're deadly to read.

I can't imagine a flight without any means to entertain myself.

And I've never seen a book I'm really interested in in the airport book stores, or if I have, I've already read it and own a copy.

Has some airport employees seen the shawshank redemption too many times?

Is the next step after taking away our entertainment mandatory sedation during the flight, for our own safety?

Sorry but I could stomach most of the other temporary restrictions, but taking away books hacks me off something fierce.

Also, the book publishing industry, especially in Great Britain, has razor thin margins. Ask anyone in the book industry and airports make up a massive, truly massive, quantity of sales. Cut out that and you're condemning many of their publishers to bankruptcy. In fact, for America, I've been told that there is a surefire way to make the new york times bestseller list, and that's to get a display at airport terminals. You'll sell enough copies that even if your book wasn't available in regular bookstores you'd make the top ten.


Adam

(you know an entrepreneur could have made a lot of money yesterday showing up with a thousand padded envelopes and a boatload of postage and offering to mail people's belongings back to their local residence. I imagine it would have hacked off airline workers drooling over the bonanza of resellable and free stuff yesterday, but man you could have made some serious cash mailing some of the stuff people were forced to toss)

I was imagining an exchange area in the concourse where people departing could hand their stuff to people arriving.

I dunno how I am going to manage the boredom and extreme discomfort (no legroom!) of the occasional long-ass transatlantic flight (next one is this december) without booze .

But then again, the duty-free joints are after security checkpoints, perhaps those purchases are allowed?

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H

i wouldn't think so, one of the guys arrested worked at heathrow, and had full access to any part of the airport, i wouldn't think the screeners would trust the duty free shop (and its employees) just because it was behind security checkpoints. i've not flown in a long time, but is it actually possible to get past the security checkpoints, buy something in the duty free shop, and put it in your carry on bag without anyone else checking it before you get on the plane?

CJ

No, they're not, in fact the duty free shops have pulled the booze and perfume off the shelves.
But, I was assuming the flight attendants were still selling drinks.

I was speaking to a friend of mine who is an expert in the matters being discussed, and believe me, there is a *very* good reason why books and magazines are banned and which I've no intention of repeating. As I'm flying from a UK airport this week, I'm grateful for this neurotic level of security. I know that some of it appears to suck, but everything being done is for a reason. [And for those who need a drink whilst flying, alcohol is still being served on board].

All I hope is that this time the Brit police have arrested the right guys. I don't know if the news made it to the USA, but a couple of recent high profile arrests of 'terrorist cells' resulted in everyone being released without charge (except for one guy who was accidentally shot and then subsequently charged with having child porn on his computer).

So many people have been used to bringing their own entertainment on board that they will be very pissed off when they find out that most of the in-flight entertainment equipment doesn't work!

You know, that doesn't sound too bad to me.

I don't know why, as it would seem to only be marginally more difficult for a terrorist to slip a case of liquid explosives on-board with the food service supplies.

A little reminiscent of 5th Element huh? :]

Except that they'd have to receive the two 'correct' bottles and have the other ingredients to hand (including an electronic trigger). I can really see a typical member of cabin crew allowing anyone (let alone someone with a Muslim name) to pick and choose amongst the bottles on the trolley, can't you? I don't know how much of this story you've seen in the USA, but there's been practically nothing but this story in the UK news for the last couple of days. Basically the plot involved smuggling two harmless liquids on board in separate containers and then mixing them before detonating them with an electronic device. Any of you with a reasonable knowledge of chemistry should be able to work out a basic workable recipe [but for ****'s sake please no speculation on the details here] that would accomplish this goal and hence why the various items on the banned list are there.

Any reason why we shouldn't speculate on the details? If my understanding that this sort of stuff is only a google search and a trip to the grocery store away is correct, then it can't be that secret, can it? Are you just worried about giving these fucknuts more ideas, or is there more to it?

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H

They might as well have people board flights naked, too. A clothed passenger is a mistrusted passenger.

Purely that. I'm sure that terrorist cells are already perfectly well-versed in anything I can think up, but I don't want to give a casual reader any ideas that might start to germinate.

Yeah, I'm sure the U.S. press has probably blabbed it all over repeatedly anyway. They're always doing their best to give the terrorists new ideas and scenarios that they may not have thought of already, not to mention revealing all of our military and defensive moves.

I have heard of a nude travel agency offering just such a trip to nudist resorts in Mexico and Jamaica. Maybe they are ahead of the curve as far as that thinking goes!

I don't claim to have a reasonable knowledge of chemistry. But getting back to the original topic, how does any of this explain why books are banned? They're neither liquid nor electronic

Here's a handy summary of some of the current restrictions:

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...s/15259034.htm

This is just ridiculous. They may as well cancel air travel altogether.

As far as my end of it (air traffic control), we are being kept in the dark, too. We have had a reuest for some minor information if we see it, but not told why. Nor have we been informed of all the reasns for the restrictions. We know what everyone else knows from the news.