Having spoken about this at length with the actual people concerned (Needless to say JK’s Office declined to comment, what actually happened (Officially documented fact incidentally) is that the person in question was significantly over her personal carry on luggage weight and by significantly i mean nearly double. It was pointed out that something had to be put in with her hold luggage and seeing that reams of A4 Paper seemed to be the largest and singularly the heaviest item (And it wasnt clear that the bound paper was indeed a manuscript) she was asked to put it in her hold luggage, without explaination she flatly refused, several times.

SECURITY WERE THEN CALLED AFTER THE FACT and only when she was forced to divulge what was in the package was she allowed by security to take the item on the plane.

It is no more complicated than that im afraid. She didnt tell them what was in the package and therefore how important it was, nor indeed was she helpful in anyway (As hard it it may be for you to believe, seeing as we clearly all know her intimately) However once security ascertained what it was they spoke to the airline (As its their policy on weight not security’s)and the airline then relaxed their rules for her.

I hope this sheds some light on some seriously misrepresented media reporting.

kind regards and stay safe

andy

your situation is an excellent reason to reform the way security is done, not that I think it is likely to happen unfortunately.

And I think your point about your friend at Ben Gurion is an important one. It was a minor inconvenience for me, but I was in Israel for 7 weeks to take a course. The situation with people in other lines of work is entirely different, as you rightly point out.

However, if your work involves constant travel and there is no choice but to fly, it weighs on you. In certain areas of work it makes it impossible to do your work — if you’re a musician for instance. This doesn’t apply only to musicians who play Beethoven either.

The amount of traveling I’ve done has varied over the years, but one thing I’ve noticed fairly consistently since 2001 - at small airports in the US, I’m almost always asked to step aside for a secondary screening. The larger airports tend to see enough people who look like me that it’s not an issue, but not the rural airports. Nor airports situated in cities with demographics that don’t feature Arab-Americans, South Asians, Persians, etc.

I try not to be annoyed, but it is very, very hard. I understand these folks are doing their job, but it’s a policy I strongly disagree with. There are studies that show that racial profiling doesn’t work. It’s much better to look to other kinds of indicators - you’ll have much better luck identifying criminal activity.

I remember talking with an acquaintance about this. He asked if it didn’t make sense for all of us to put up with the small delays in order to make sure air travel was safe. My response was that I, and others who look like me or share similar names, are being asked to bear a larger share of the load for a system that by its nature is faulty.

And anyone who travels knows that the process is ripe for Murphy’s Law to enter into play. Imagine not being able to run through the airport to catch a plane for fear of being shot. (Happened to me.) Imagine almost missing a plane because of delays at security. (That too.) It gets frustrating.

I rather like what they do at Ben Gurion. Every single person coming into the airport gets into a line. While you are in this line, you are approached by one of several nice pleasant young people, who speak your primary language, and they engage you in a pleasant conversation about why you were in Israel, how long you were there, what you were doing, and why and where you are returning.

I have a dear friend and colleague, a very nice woman from North Carolina, who dreads Ben Gurion. She hates going through that airport with a passion. Whenever she goes through, she gets held up for hours. The reason? She works for an international law/justice organization. She and others who work in international aid/human rights have a miserable time going through Ben Gurion.

Then again, I watch border security and my husband has worked as a Passenger Screening Officer for Sydney Airport. You’d be surprised at what type of weapons and contrabands people will try to smuggle through objects that seem innocent in appearance.

I suppose J.K Rowlings’s manuscript would only have been passed through once it was xrayed, sniffed out and tested for harmful chemicals. Security at airports need to stick to rules, otherwise we’d be sorry.

It is possible for some official (Yes, I do believe if such a decision was made it wasn’t at the guard’s level) to decide, after examining it, that this specific manuscript is not dangerous. This, however, will require specifying what exactly make other books and paper dangerous, because if they can’t say that then they can’t say that this manuscript hasn’t been tampered with in the same unspecified way.

Making a judgement call on the person is not legitimate, however. If there is a class of people who can carry things which most people can’t, and if we assume (as apparently many airport security organizations around the world do, for some reason) that these things can indeed be dangerous, all it does is make these exempt people a target.
If Rowling can carry something that a terrorist wants to put on a plane, but couldn’t otherwise, then a terrorist will either try to forge Rowling’s ID, or threaten Rowling’s husband/kids/parents/whoever in order to get her to carry the stuff.
Rowling’s is very probably not a terrorist (I don’t know her well enough to vouch for her personally ), but that only holds as long as nobody is allowed to officially decide that. Once that is done, she, and anyone in the same category, is actually more of a security risk.

As for her not being a security risk because she is able to rent a private plane, that’s a non-sequitur. I mean, I’m pretty sure that most large terror groups can afford to rent a private plane as well. So what? If someone will come to a plane, and admit that they’re working for Al-Qaeda, should they let them carry stuff on the dangerous items list as well?

The concern is what gets on the general travel planes. And if manuscripts are forbidden (Which is/would be terribly and totally stupid and wrong), then they should be forbidden for everyone.

In the meantime the Harry Potter saga is the most popular of the materials included in the limited Guantâ—™namo (hey! what happened to our alt function to provide correct accents and diacriticals?) prison library.

By the way, if you’re not sure about some of the statements in the article linked to above, you can look at today’s NY Times Sunday Magazine, for the article, The Battle for Guantánamo.

Love, C.

As for Rowling getting the manuscript through on a judgement call, judgement calls are made all the time. For example, Laura Bush is not an elected official but is still allowed to take her lipstick on a plane.

Rowling could have chartered a private plane or even bought a cruise ship.

However, my actual concern these days vis a vis the final HP volume, is where shall I obtain it, since Scholastic has been so dramatically revealed to be allied with the darkness. Those ’study guides’ to that vile dramamentary that ran on ABC 9/10 and 9/11 were the creation of Scholastic. They’ve done this before too, for Big Oil and other lying groups, it turns out.

Not another cent to Scholastic.

I’ll have to get a British or Canadian copy, I guess.

Love, C.