for a resident desi canadian, in the 70s & 80s, all that was needed was a landed immigrant status stamp on the desi passport, and you could breeze through u.s. immigration checkpoints without filling any forms which rest of the world did.

moreover, as a canadian, we need only to show our driver’s licence at the border to drive into the states.

i used to envy the americans, who could see off their family right into the seat of the plane, whereas in canada, we followed the indian/british policy of stranding the sends offs at the ticket counter.

i cannot but feel sad at the tightening of the u.s. border controls, but i believe it is an inevitable result of the terrorist attacks on u.s. soil.

for canadians it is doubly hard, for many of us, whites or desi heritage, look upon the concept of entering, living and working in the usa as an entitlement, and this attitude has been encouraged by the canadian governments of the past, and tolerated by the various u.s. administrations.

hence, to me, it was a shockingly unpleasant surprise, when i met someone, whose two daughters had to return to canada because their TN visa was not renewed, when the girls moved to a new job. like all desis i supported obama’s election, but sometimes, i am perforced to think, that from a desi viewpoint, the republicans and bush were friendlier or tolerant of our aspirations than the democrats.

as a regular visitor to the usa, i find the current regulations at the canadian airports,where we are pre cleared for entry to the usa, a wee bit tighter than before, but nowhere near some of the interrogations that i, with a canadian passport, have faced in britain (always polite though) or germany or even in new delhi/mumbai.

i do not see us going back to the days of easy travel in my lifetime. maybe never. one of the less savoury legacies of our generation to our kids.

Are YOU serious? Arabs/Pakis are the ones singled out the most, not Indians. Being named “Mohammad” is enough to guarantee a “random” security check every time you fly. Let’s be blunt since I hate being PC: In America, Indians are stereotyped as smart little Engineers/MDs with smelly food, but Arabs/Pakis are always stereotyped as terrorists. I seriously hope you don’t think Indians are being singled out while the Arabs skip on by to board first.

Again, by your logic, all muslims should be instantly singled out and searched.

Muslims don’t have green crescents stamped on our foreheads, you know. They can’t exactly announce: “ATTENTION: All Muslims report to Security for a “Random” security check!” Instead anyone who looks like they could be muslim (most Indians/Bengalis) get “Randomly” checked.

Actually, what makes no sense is your logic here. If the immigration guys are smart enough to know someone is from India, then couldn’t they also tell that they were muslim from their name?

Oh Good Grief – they can tell someone is from India because it clearly says “India” on the front of their passport in BIG BOLD letters, not because they have any famiarity with the culture. It obviously won’t say “Muslim” or “Hindu” or “Sikh” etc on their passport. Do you honestly think most Americans can distinguish between Hindu/Muslim/Sikh/etc names? Nope.

And I agree the Indian Ambassador should have been shown a lot more respect, not singled out in the first place.

Claims that it’s safe are based on the idea that you’re exposed to more cosmic radiation on the plane than you are through the backscatter. I think the scanner is equivalent to about 2 minutes on the plane. So it’s not necessarily that it’s safe, just that simply being on the plane is much worse than the scanner. This is partly why women are discouraged from flying while pregnant. I think there is some spot in the midpoint of the pregnancy where the baby is especially vulnerable but I’m among the few of us who was not destined for a career in medicine so you’ll have to find some other Indian for a better answer.

Of course, ionizing radiation is ionizing radiation and the aim in general should be to minimize exposure. We shouldn’t be so cavalier about being like “Oh it’s just a little bit.”

You said “Second, what does India being a democracy that has suffered from terrorism have to do with anything? “. Are you serious? In comparison, to say, a country like Pakistan or an Arab country suspected to be heavily involved in terrorism, who would you pick? Clearly, a terrorist can be from anywhere but using your logical steps – Pakistan is strongly suspected of being a terrorist haven, most terrorists these days are muslim, let’s search all the Pakistanis and Arabs since they are all Muslim. What is partly being commented on here is that does not seem to be happening. Again, by your logic, all muslims should be instantly singled out and searched.

You said “That makes no sense. FIrst, clearly they have the person’s passport in front of them and can tell what nation they’re from. Second, what does India being a democracy that has suffered from terrorism have to do with anything? Let’s be blunt here, reality is more along the lines of: - Airport security singles out Muslims a lot - India has a massive Muslim popluation, more than any Middle Eastern country - Therefore Indians (most non-Muslim and obviously non-terrorist) are going to get singled out more” Actually, what makes no sense is your logic here. If the immigration guys are smart enough to know someone is from India, then couldn’t they also tell that they were muslim from their name? Assuming of course, they are travelling under their real name. The point being made is that immigration guys may not be aware of the differences between brown people. And the real point here is that the ambassador should have been shown a little more respect – not too much to ask for cordial diplomatic relations with a supposed ally, right?

They start by understanding that people hijack planes rather than waterbottles and swiss-army knives.

They have a bunch of trained profilers at the check-in counter and the security guards are trained to spot suspicious behavior. They watch you as you go about your business and before you check in the profiler will give you a short interview (reason for travel, etc.) They’re trained interrogators so they know what to look out for. Once you pass the interview you get on the plane with no fuss. No real worries about removing shoes or any of that malarkey. They just do a quick X-Ray to make sure nothing dangerous is in your bag, and by dangerous they mean things that are liable to blow up in an airplace cabin by accident like fireworks.

They do random spot-checks on bags, coats, and cars but not to everyone.

If the profiler does determine that you’re suspicious then you go in for a more thorough security check which is about on par with what we do to everyone.

On a flight back to NY from Afghanistan like 4 years ago, my grandma checked off that we had spent time on a farm, and then we were interrogated by some security guy (in America) and had our bags inspected to make sure we weren’t smuggling back “farm produce” (read: Opium, it’s like candy there).

Hahaha I love this….although to be fair, most terrorists aren’t as dumb as the underwear-bomber

WHY is our security system so much more intrusive than Israel’s whilst being less effective in spite of Israel’s larger profile as a target? These are the questions you should be asking yourself. Not “how long does it take to put my shoes back on?”

what is israel’s security system like, for those of you who are familiar with it?

These numbskulls used to remove our HDCam tapes and batteries and swab them for terrorist pixie dust. They used to swab CABLES. They were so bloody incapable of thought that they couldn’t be bothered, however, to look inside of the tape slot to see if maybe someone had stuck anything in there.

Let me make this clear to those who don’t know about big TV cameras: there’s a lot of room in one of them to store something nefarious. A lot. But, while these nincompoops were too busy swabbing the cables of doom, they never bothered looking inside the tape slot. Brilliant!

Taking off shoes, telling people they can bring 20 3 oz bottles but not a 60 oz bottle (seriously?), or peanut butter for goodness sake, is theater for the sake of calming the frightened masses. It does nothing to make us safer. If this link shows us anything, it’s that TSA is making us less safe by giving us a false sense of security: http://consumerist.com/2010/12/eagle-eyed-tsa-screeners-dont-notice-loaded-handgun-in-mans-carry-on.html

By making people think we’re safe by groping kids and the occasional grandma, we’re actually making ourselves significantly less safe. It’s just a stupid state of affairs, and it’s frightening to see how many Americans are willing to let Big Brother encroach upon what should be pretty clear boundaries.