The trans community has made huge strides in their fight for equality and acknowledgement this year. However, some protocols haven’t gotten up to speed yet such as how to properly search trans men and women.
They may appear one way in their clothing, but a TSA agent wouldn’t know what to think if they saw something they feel shouldn’t be there.
For instance, Shadi Petosky was getting ready to board her flight in Orlando, but was unfortunately embarrassed by an unsuspecting TSA agent when he didn’t realize that she was trans! She was stopped at the full-body scanner after spotting an “anomaly” on the screen.
“The TSA agent reportedly asked Petosky to go back through the scanner under the male calibration,” says NY Daily News, “but she refused and then declined to say whether she was a man or a woman.”
They also reported that next, Shadi bluntly told a male TSA agent, “That’s my penis,” explaining that she was transgender. What followed this was just plain rude though! Shadi, in tears, was grilled about her gender and was later subjected to a 40-minute pat-down and inspection, causing her to miss her flight to Minneapolis.
Shadi took to social media to document her ordeal and has since attracted attention from transgender activists, American Airlines reps and TSA officials.
According to NYDN, “Shadi repeatedly asked the TSA agents if they were properly trained with a transgender policy, but heard only one response: “I know what I am doing.”
Trans men and women are usually subject to more security checks, concealed in Homeland Security documents. TSA tweeted transgender activist Jenny Boyle, who recently appeared on I Am Cait, after asking twitter to warn TSA against abusing Shadi in Orlando.
At least they acknowledged that something went wrong with how they handled Shadi’s high-profile incident! They said, “TSA takes all potential civil rights violations very seriously. We are looking into the situation now for further information.”
Source Cited: NY Daily News http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/trans-woman-upset-tsa-scanners-flagging-body-anomaly-article-1.2369457
TSR Intern: Talia O. @theclosetratchet on Instagram & @tallyohhh on Twitter!
