Background, Me
I flew once as a teen, one-way. Like getting on a roller-coaster; follow the group. Flew once round-trip with a queer work group, already terrified of body scanners but they were rare and no one else was worried and nothing happened.
Was asked to, couple times, for weddings, best friends. Work conferences. Actual job offers. Said no.
Finally after eight years decided to try it. Had my ID docs all ready, matching and correct, minus the passport I still can’t get without lying about my gender. Researched. Talked to friends. To therapist. Called airline. Emailed airline. Webchatted airline. Called TSA. Was told they assign an agent based on the gender you Look Like On The Day (binary options). Had my call dropped and not returned mid-question; let it go. Watched videos.
Chose what to pack. Followed guidelines. Left things behind. Read every prep list. Had already read every bit of trans advice. Chose what to wear. Arranged a disabled-autistic-hardofhearing+first-time Special Needs Request to have an Advocate guide me through.
Dunno where you’re supposed to meet up with said advocate.
Was in too much of a “let’s get through this and over with” to deal with the long ticketing counter lines and closed information booth.
Advice, Factors
Lanes
“Disabled, first-timer, special needs passengers, special line.”
The signs aren’t necessarily by or pointing to clear line entrances. If you end up in a Regular line they won’t notice or tell you so.
You can’t see what agents are doing patdowns from where you get in line, probably, so you can’t choose.
Notifications
They don’t read them.
DISABLED, DEAF, OTHER. Bold print at the top of a boarding pass, no one looks. NOTE: NON-BINARY, NOT MALE OR FEMALE. Notes aren’t necessarily printed at all. GENDER MARKER: X. If checked by TSA it isn’t mentioned and it’s by the line entryperson, who is different from the baggage conveyor belt person, who is different from the “step into the scanner” person, who is different from the “step out of the scanner” people. Nothing’s getting conveyed.
What Gender Do You Look Like (To Some Person)
You don’t get to say your gender, or choose between two agents. Nor is it based on any ID or letter. You aren’t told which of two scanner buttons they push. An agent is assigned to you if you are to be patdown. It’s not clear who assigns; both of the two working patdowns? Probably not appealable.
In my case, my dysphoria over their having that decision and the Literal Nothing I Can Do to be read male since I am not even in a tux despite my total lack of sex characteristics meant I chose to (pretend to) make that decision for them by wearing a skirt.
Somehow I doubt that works for everyone because What Gender You Look Like is as we know so very little about clothes.
Clothing Thickness
Apparently denim or thick fabrics can be less penetrable by the scanning rays and flag as areas requiring patdown. Wear thinner fabrics. (You already know from FAQs and other advice about prosthetics, layers, pockets.)
Underwear Shape Matters
If you’re wearing boxer briefs under a skirt, that’s apparently going to trip the scanner and require an upper thigh patdown.
TSA uses front of hands now as of 2017 apparently. Everything I read suggested they start lower and move up until they meet resistance; my experience was starting at the top and moving down. Maybe that has to do with skirts.
I dunno what to do for tactile barrier plus not tripping that. Tights/leggings exist. Do those trip it?
Striking The Pose
There aren’t necessarily signs or guidelines posted in advance. The visual diagram of the pose you have to hold in the scanner is inside the scanner and not visible from outside. If you say it’s your first time and ask what the pose is they tell you to look inside; you can’t see it until you are fully inside.
Your feet are supposed to go on the yellow feet on the floor. They will tell you this but it may be hard to hear/understand especially if you are hard of hearing. You can’t look at the feet and and the pose at the same time.
The pose is with feet somewhat spread on the yellow guide marks, with hands up as though behind your head but stopping just before touching the sides of your head. “Mid jumping jack.” So nothing overlaps, probably. You should be facing and looking straight at the pose diagram. About three seconds.
Practice, maybe.
Wait
Okay come walking out normallYWait. No clear place where to stop but must immediately. Already assigned you whatever gender agent who’s telling you to pause.
Yellow Highlighter Boxes on Silhouette
You get to see it pop up and where it’s selected.
According to some articles the agents have authority to search more than that, as well.
Happening
Articles emphasize that you can leave at any time. You can’t go back through the scanner. Can’t go through security again. Can’t take your flight.
Obviously that’s costly, money, time, energy. If you’re trans, non-binary, intersex, (Muslim, Black), it’s not like your body’s going to get more White Cis Abled and pass next time rebooked. But yeah, Totally Agency To Leave. Just like totally agency to never fly and that totally never affects quality of life or employment opportunities.
Sure feels like if you show any hesitation that’s suspicious. They outright say being nervous is and they select for further screening based on it.
They don’t remind you or ask you if you want to leave.
Speaking
“I’m trans, so you know.” “That’s fine.” Read: That’s irrelevant to them unless it registers as a surprise after they didn’t listen.
“Will it hurt to touch anywhere?” The only question they might ask. Can throw you off if unexpected. Is meant purely physically. Isn’t really an opportunity to name trauma or touch aversion, probably.
Three Seconds
About as long as posing in the scanner. At least, if it’s checking over two spots.
Grab Your Stuff, Clear the Area
Move away so the next person can come through. Don’t hold up the line. Get your things off the conveyor belt. Don’t pick them out of the buckets, take the whole trays away and then bring the empty ones back or they’ll say “Don’t get dressed here” even if none of it is clothes. There’s probably a bench or two kind of close so you can sit and tie your shoes.
Probably nobody will say the slightest thing to or acknowledge you no matter how distressed or long you sit there if you’re mostly quiet.
Info? Help?
Don’t expect an info table past the security screening. Or anything other than gates and shops. Not a clear TSA person to approach from this side either.
Announcements Over Mics
Every damn announcement will be over a PA and its audio clarity horrible. Even if you’re near and actively watching the speaker, they all press up against the mic and til their head down and have desk rises blocking views of their mouths. Same on the plane except it’s attendants and passengers moving in front of them constantly, if you even sit near enough to see.
None of the on-flight staff know any of your Bolded or Noted or Special Needs info, either.
No Checkout
Do guides for flying even say this? You just walk out of the airport. To baggage claim for checked things. Just straight out if not.
It’s out of your control.
It’s a coercive system.
Lots of cis white abled straight nonsurvivor people are still traumatized and upset by it, actually.
Doing everything possible to be prepared doesn’t actually necessarily lessen it, nor make it any more under your control.
Somatic staining feelings are awful and you know they’re buried worse when you’re thinking about needing to not feel them forever but that doesn’t mean you’re embedding it into yourself agentively.
There really aren’t many neutral grounding things near the screening exit. Maybe your items, especially the clothes you wore through and don’t have to get out of your bag.
It’s not your fault if you don’t think to consider something so normal to you even if it seems so obviously Alerting to other people that they don’t even put it on a list of advice for flying while trans, like your favorite underwear.
It’s not your fault if you are smoothed into the not-speaking-up flow-through Assumed Abled Cis that the system is built around piping. Even if you suspected anticipated planned for that to happen and were cognizant of it happening.
It’s not your fault that it’s impossible to think of everything. Just like it’s not your fault that even everything is not necessarily enough.
It’s not your fault that physicality is normalized and glorified, particularly in relation to cop shows and security. Desensitizing is part of their objective.
Just because other people find it no big deal, doesn’t mean you should. Oversensitivity is armchair diagnosis and a club weapon and you have reasons even if they are nothing to do with ~rationality.
Just because worse things happen, to others or to you, doesn’t change how this feels. How it happens, processes, lives, in you.
Your experience is happening with or without you. Wanting it to not, doesn’t change that.
Overwriting the somatic memory with a newer stronger sameplace one isn’t the only way to lessen its intensity. Especially if touch-aversion feelings are strengthened contextually.
Security theatre is about making you feel small.
Echoes pop up. Some of them can be newly remembered and ugly. They can feel even more minimizing and pathetic. Even though you’ve logically named and read and thought through how things like familial bullying work.
You don’t have to laugh. You don’t have to accept it’s culture.
You don’t have to be okay.
epochryphal 