Topic: 1st Amendment
Flight attendants now asked to be porn police The flight attendants are supposed to stop people from viewing porn while in flight. On the surface that may seem reasonable, but who defines porn-on-the-spot?by Dave Stancliff
(libertarian)
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
By Dave Stancliff Flight attendants on commercial airplanes have a hard enough time smiling these days, as the popularity of flying drops to new lows, without having to be porn police too.
Since 911, flight attendants have been asked to watch for terrorists while bringing drinks and food to the passengers. Their required to provide emergency information and to attend to the special needs of all passengers, including the unruly ones.
They have to sell meals, alcoholic drinks, headphones, and even blankets and pillows.Being a flight attendant today is a far cry from the glory days of commercial aviation when the public didn't despise the airlines.
Once their job was considered exotic and fun. Now flight attendants are being asked to take on one more task, monitoring what people watch on their laptops in flight!
I'm referring to Delta Airlines who are going to have a Mobile Broad Network available - for a price of course- on all of their airplanes by 2009. This wi-fi access comes with complications that include First Amendment issues.
The flight attendants are supposed to stop people who are viewing porn while in-flight. On the surface that my seem reasonable, but what about who defines porn-on-the-spot?
Delta has suggested that other passengers will help in this policing effort, and put some social pressure on porn viewers. The problem with that is what if the person is viewing an art site? Nudes in art are quite common. So you have this guy looking at masterpieces by great oil painters and the person besides him gets indignant and cries, "Porn!"
So, to play the scenario out, other passengers start harassing the man viewing the art site and pretty soon someone takes his lap top away! The fight that ensues disrupts everyone and the pilot has to make an emergency landing now to arrest the porn peeper and to get medical help for the flight attendant who has two black eyes.
There are other issues like a person who sits in the front of the plane complaining about someone in the back peering at porn. Or, what appears to be porn. What is reasonable? That probably needs to be spelled out more clearly without infringing on someone else's right to read and view things.
Morality is a tricky thing to legislate, let alone impose upon people in a public place on-the-spot. If providing this internet access with restrictions and provisions doesn't open the already cash-strapped airlines to lawsuits, then I'll be surprised.
Having flight attendants impose this murky etiquette is just asking too much. Other airlines, are letting it be known that their set-ups for the internet will contain filters and blocking capabilities to prevent porn.
Why don't internet cafes prohibit porn in public? Because it's not really a problem. People have shown enough control in public that the few who do view get social cues that usually encourage them to stop. Nothing is perfect however, and sometimes people behave like idiots.
But should the rest be deprived full access because of that one idiot? There's no doubt that every now and then some clown just has to push the envelope, but to ban anything on the internet while in flight is draconian. What's true in other public places that provide internet access can be true for airlines too.
When companies start restricting our free access to the internet then there's a problem. This is America. Not China, who eased up on their internet restrictions slightly for the Olympics, but have clamped back down on it now.
Putting blockers on, as some airlines have said their going to do, is no better than having flight attendants playing porn police. If Delta, and the rest of the big carriers, do go ahead as planned, then they can expect more controversy and people ready to defend their First Amendment rights.
As It Stands, eyes in the skies shouldn't be spies.
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The views expressed in this
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I see where you are going, but I think we're talking about private property (airline) and also being in a confined place where everything you do on your laptop is really in their "private space"
S.L.A.P.S. or not, its the airlines call, not the government.
Dave just wants to see his porn the next time he flights! Just kidding.
It's still the airlines call as it would be your call inside your own home. This flight attendant porn police has happened before with porn magazines. You can always have a magazine, picture, go to the bathroom to joint the mile-high club or use a sheet covering yourself and the person next to you while using your hand on each other or some other form of soft core live action porn. Its a long trip and its boring. Anything can happen.
About 15 years ago I flew to Tokyo in JAL (Japan Air Lines) and they had the porn magazines there provided by the airline themselves for the long trip. With not much to do on such a long trip, it certainly made the trip more pleasant. You could just ask the attendant for the Playboy or Penthouse or pick it up yourself from the rack near the restrooms. How convenient! The teenagers inside the airplane were having a blast. Of course, the setback is the sticky pages and the long lines to the bathrooms. The cleaning personel must have had a tough time. Those would be the first complaining.
Posted By: Jahfre Fire Eater
Date: 2008-08-28 17:49:57
I wouldn't worry much about it being enforced. Most flights I've been on this summer they don't enforce anything. They make announcements about putting seat backs in full upright position, putting bags fully under the seat in front of you, turn off all electric devices, etc. All of this goes unenforced. Just Tuesday night, the kid next to me was sprawled out, playing his video game with no seatbelt on, his mom was fully reclined and had two bags under her feet that were not even close to under the seat in front of her. Not a word from a flight attendant. People get up and walk around when the seat belt sign is lit too. It seems many people think they can do anything they want, any time they want...and they are right.
Americans are trained from the cradle that warnings aren't real unless someone tells you specifically to follow it. Otherwise, anything they can get away with is fair game. There are no consequences for most violations of warnings and rules these days.
Unless your act can be viewed as a terrorist threat in any way, then you have some consequences.
okay, I can see what you are saying, but you are taking it a bit over-the-top. The scenario you laid out was a bit overzealous and extremely unlikely. I don't forsee anyone getting into a fistfight on an airliner over some "art", especially when those who are involved will knowingly face jail time for it.
Not to mention, even if this person was an art collector/dealer and they were looking at this website strictly for work purposes... If someone objects to having it next to them, I still don't see why this person wouldn't be able to put off viewing it until they land.
But morality aside, every business has the right to decide what is and is not acceptable within the confines of their merchandise. In the same way that I can choose what I do and do not allow guests to view on the internet in my own house, the airlines can choose what they do and do not allow to be viewed on their flights.
But the overall flaw in your argument is that you are basing it on the 1st amendment and you are confusing what the 1st amendment is all about. It's about the freedom of SPEECH, not the freedom of VIEWING. Nobody is saying they can't put these things on the internet... Delta airlines is just saying that you cannot VIEW it via their equipment, and they are WELL within their rights to do so.
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