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April 4, 2003 1:16 PM

"What can escape the eye of God all seeing?" Milton asked. The impossibility of escape from "the eye" is often the very root of what it means to be, like Kokusai Omocha, a "cyborg." The inescapable eye fantasy powers brilliant, archetypal designs of prisons, low brow toy sales and the scourge of the Internet. 108 years ago, the fear of "the eye" induced entrepenuers to invent lead underwear to foil newly invented X-Rays from seeing too much. Today, in the name of security, these metaphors, fantasies and fears all are coming together at a few airports near you.
posted by limitedpie (5 comments total)

If the government wants to know what religion I practice, they could just ask me ...
posted by WolfDaddy at 1:26 PM on April 4, 2003

If this wasn't put in use for everyone, and just used as an alternative to a strip search, which I believe is rather more demeaning, then this is a better option. If they start using it on everyone, then that's a little too much.
posted by riffola at 1:31 PM on April 4, 2003

Lead lined underwear comes a lot closer to the present day than you might think!

Question: what happens with these scanners if you wear your lead lined underwear over your Thunderwear?
posted by NortonDC at 1:48 PM on April 4, 2003

I'm less concerned about BodySearch than I am about the TSA's experiment with data mining.
posted by homunculus at 1:54 PM on April 4, 2003

Correction, that should be:

Since at least August 21, 2000, in the name of security, these metaphors, fantasies and fears all have been coming together at a few airports near you.
posted by shabrem at 3:19 PM on April 4, 2003