We Are Change opt-out airport activism: Permit Required?

We Are Change
December 2, 2010

A look at some of the activism that took place across the country in our nations airports during the Thanksgiving holiday opt-out day.

WAC Utah’s Opt Out Day – “Permit Required”
http://www.wearechange.org/?p=4734
WAC Utah Told We Need Permit to Hand Out Information

Four members of our Chapter peacefully and unobtrusively offered airport travelers information about the intrusive body scanners damage, including documented evidence that shows they are unsafe, especially for at-risk persons such as children or people with who already have chromosomal damage.

Our group split into two teams: one to talk to passengers coming off the baggage claim area, and another group who spoke with travelers in line at the TSA checkpoint. After successfully handing out about 150 flyers, one of our members was accosted by the Airport Police: these are officers who, by their own admission, work for “Salt Lake City Corp” – a private corporation. The officers struggled to explain to our member Clint that, in order to hand out information, one must first obtain a permit. But by having a permit, if one is in violation of certain sections of the permit, one may be cited with a misdemeanor charge.

This double-bind scenario they offer, one in which you essentially give up your Constitutional right to free speech in order to lock you into a more restrictive arrangement, was nonsense to Clint. The officers wanted Clint to walk over to their office in the adjacent terminal building to obtain a permit (i.e. contract), upon which, they certainly would have cited him (and perhaps others in our group) with a misdemeanor violation of the contract.

Clint tried to explain the fallacy of the City’s position (as explained by the representative of their corporation), but the officer just couldn’t seem to grasp the concept that the First Amendment trumps any city code enforcement statute or permit requirement. Further, the officer posed that somehow the public access areas of the airport were exempt from those rights. Watch the videos above.

We Are Change Tampa Exposes TSA; Stopped from passing out fliers and ‘talking to passengers’ unless they have ‘legitimate business’

http://www.wearechange.org/?p=4722

Wac Tampa spread truth around TIA exposing the body scanners and corruption of TSA, we are kicked out by police,
Stand Up and Say NO National opt out day Nov 24 and anytime you fly, let the government know we will not accept this tyranny!