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To: maceng2 who wrote (78911)	10/28/2001 6:01:20 AM
From: d:oug	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116752

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX: You have two cows. some X's that can be detailed USA FED w/ ALAN GREENSPAM USA FED wo/ ALAN GREENSPAM AREA 51 QUEBEC CITY, QUEBEC QUEBEC CITY, QUEBEC (Chatter's version) Bill Gate's MICROSOFT O49R/GOLD_TUTOR w/ Mule

To: maceng2 who wrote (78911)	10/30/2001 10:57:55 PM
From: Richnorth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116752

"Freak out" rule in force on US aircraft By WILLIAM RASPBERRY WASHINGTON POST straitstimes.asia1.com.sg I HEARD the story at just the right time. I was fresh off a Southwest Airlines flight from Raleigh-Durham, and I was still annoyed. The security people at the airport had confiscated my cigar cutter. Well, they didn't really confiscate it; they told me I could throw it away or go to the ticket counter (where the line was 40-minutes long) and check it in. That's right, check in a 7.6-cm plastic gizmo. I threw it away, of course, but I was still smarting at the silliness. I could have done more damage with a broken lens from my spectacles. Then I talked to Mr Eric Newton of the Knight Foundation in Miami. He was a passenger on a recent US Airways flight from Washington Dulles International to Philadelphia. The plane left the gate only to return a few minutes later. A sick crew member, the announcement from the cockpit said. Mr Newton said: ""Two security guys got on and walked to the back of the plane. Two young Arabic-looking men and an Arabic-looking woman were quietly escorted off the plane.'' A passenger asked a flight attendant if the "sick crew member'' was okay, Mr Newton reports. No one was sick, the attendant admitted. It was just a ruse to get back to the gate. And the people who wanted to leave? Well, they didn't really want to leave. Here is Mr Newton's account: "She [the attendant] said the two men had "icy stares' and wouldn't make eye contact with her and that she became so frightened she was "shaking all over'. "She reported her concerns to the pilot, who told her it was her call, and she said she decided the men should not be on the plane, that she did not feel safe. "She took the names of some of the passengers who agreed that the three ejectees "looked strange'.'' No one objected to their removal. Mr Newton wishes now that he had. He understands that a kind of "freak out'' rule is in force. Any crew member who is freaked out by the appearance or behaviour of a passenger doesn't have to make the trip. Either the crew member is replaced, or the passenger is removed. Captain's call. Question: Would the stewardess have been freaked out by an "icy stare'' from a business-suited white man? By the refusal of a Chinese-looking woman to make eye contact? Mr Abdullah Al-Arian, a Duke University senior, has described how low the freak-out threshold can be. In an article in the Duke Chronicle, he noted that on his first plane trip since the recently-tightened security, he was particularly alert to the reaction to his presence. "I felt the many eyes in the room follow me all the way to the ticket counter...I searched for a behaviour type that would ease the tension... "I avoided eye contact, but wait, I told myself, that is suspicious behaviour. Look at them. No, don't stare; that's even worse.'' Only a couple of people said anything, including a man who said, with in Mr Abdullah's earshot, that someone "should get him out of here''. Mr Abdullah himself won't fault his fellow passengers for their reactions. And he feels good about that. Mr Newton didn't do anything, but he might the next time something similar happens in his presence. He feels good about his new sensitivity. My loss of a new cigar cutter has shrunk to its proper scale and I feel good about that. I wonder if those three Philly-bound passengers at Dulles have anything to feel good about.