Just Stop is a weekly feature in which we implore you to cut that shit out right this second. This week: dumb travelers who can't separate themselves from their guns.
Do you have a gun? That's great.
Stop trying to bring it on a plane.
In a post-9/11 age of heightened airport paranoia and increased terrorism, we shouldn't even have to tell you that.
… But we do. Because apparently, record numbers of you are attempting to bring your beloved deadly weapons onto planes in your carry-on luggage this year.
In fact, just last week TSA established a new record when they confiscated a jaw-dropping 73 separate firearms from people's luggage within a seven-day period. The previous record was 68 in one week, set in last October.
Even more disturbing; of the 73 weapons confiscated by TSA that week, 68 were loaded and more than two dozen had a round in the chamber. Uncomfortable!
And the airports where this was happening aren't even airports you'd typically associate with being dangerous places for travelers; Raleigh-Durham, Dallas-Fort Worth, Phoenix, Detroit and Boston. Okay, maybe Boston … but the rest of them? Not places you'd normally feel threatened in.
We assumed most people would know this by now, but federal law bans guns in carry-on bags. However, they can be transported in checked luggage if they are unloaded and declared to the airline before the flight departs.
If this is news to you, you probably don't realize the shitstorm you can incur by trying to board a plane with a gun.
Aside from the fact that trying to do so broadcasts your complete and utter lack of brain cells, it carries a few important consequences you probably didn't consider.
First, it holds up the security line for everyone. While TSA and a bunch of bitchy drug-sniffing German Shepards search your bag and body, hundreds of people are delayed. Your dumb attachment to your firearm could mean they miss their plane. It could mean they miss their meetings, weddings, funerals, graduations, connecting flights and whatever myriad life events they have to attend to, none of which you have the right to meddle with. It could also mean they have to shell out hundreds of dollars to be rebooked onto another flight assuming that there are no free seats on the next plane.
Second, you're gonna get fined, if not imprisoned. No one's gonna pat you on the back like, "Buddy, we'll let you off this time. Just don't let it happen again, ha ha haaa."
Not a chance. According to TSA's Bob Burns, passengers who try to pack heat in the sky face fines upwards of $11,000, and if they've got priors or a worrisome record, it's county jail time.
So, although it's easy for pea brains like you to forget the damage you inflict on other travelers with your stupidity and petty need to carry a weapon at all times, it'll be real easy to remember once the consequences of your actions become personal.
Long story short, if you have a firearm, keep that shit at your house. Or if you so desperately feel you need one with you on your trip, fine. Just unload it and declare it to the airline before you board. Then you can bring your precious extension of your non-existent manhood with you at all times.
Better yet, just saddle up the old mare and ride that swaybackced steed into the sunset, cowboy. Because according to your gun-slinging ways, we're still in the Wild West. Yee-haw.
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