This is in conversation from Apple News. I'm Shimita Bassu. Today, how the TSA has managed to make flying more of a hassle and somehow not much safer.

Let's go back to 2017. A man in his late 30s goes to the airport in Detroit to fly home to Toronto.

So he's tall, brown skin, South Asian descent, facial hair, and he's wearing a turban.

He passes security without any issues.

No metal detectors or other alarm bells are set off.

But then, on the other side of the checkpoint, he's stopped by two TSA officers.

And say, look, we're not going to let you get on your airplane until you go through additional

screening.

So you need to come back with us, get a pat down in a private room and take off your turban.

The man is sick and asking him to remove his turban is against TSA protocol.

It's considered a violation of a sick person's religion.

So the man pushes back and says he will not remove his

turban. They go back and forth. He refuses, they threaten to escalate and then

it's not until this guy produces a passport that says he's not just some random person but he's actually a Canadian government

minister named Navviet Baines and that he is officially recognized by the US government as not a threat. and that's the point that they back off.

Now most of us don't have the backing of one of our closest allies, we don't have diplomatic

passports.

What are you going to do in that situation?

You're just going to submit and

then let them do it and maybe complain about it afterwards. The person you're

hearing tell us this story is Darrell Campbell. He recently wrote a piece for

The Verge called The Humiliating History of the TSA.

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