Private Parts - Part 3

News today about the airport security full-body image scanning and the objections by people, especially women, is related to my recent post about more innocent times in the 1970s. The gradual revealing of body parts for public view challenges cultural norms that have been around for a long time. The argument that the people who see the scans at the airport are not in the area of the people being scanned doesnot satisfy a sense of modesty and privacy.
So we have security and modesty in a stand off.
Even more offensive to many is the pat-down process used with persons who do not wish to have the scan. The pat downs are said to involve touching of the most private parts of the body. It is hard to imagine persons with a sense of dignity and grace undergoing the process. Both men and women are sensitive to being touched anywhere by strangers and many avoid touching within the family with the exception being their marriage or life partner.
The implications of this policy for security sake cannot yet be stated. This appears to be a new challenge to privacy which is really beyond the practices of the 1970s. The story of private parts continues.