Security theater and theme park hell

There was a time when I was routinely testing the security procedures of non-permissive environments by carrying a concealed weapon past whatever security measures are in place. I gave it up a year ago as being too expensive and too likely to trigger a red flag warning. It seems that nothing has improved.

Some friends invited us to go with them to Disney's Animal Kingdom, and my wife accepted. So, off we went. It turns out that security has not gotten any better. We approached the security checkpoint, and there were two ways in: One was through the "bag check" line, and the other through a "no bags" line. If you look at the picture, the "Guests Without Bags" entry is right in the middle of the screen, flanked by two rent a cops.

Since I had no bag and my wife had a purse, we split. I walked through the "no bags" line, and my wife went through the bag check. As soon as I passed through, I was waved over to the magnetometers (you can see them under the white tents in the picture). They were redirecting about half of the people from the "no bags" line over there.

I walked over in front of the magnetometers and waited for my wife to come through. As soon as she did, I handed most of my metal objects to her (which may or may not include weapons of some sort) and she placed them in her freshly inspected purse. We waited our turn, the wife placed her purse on the table next to my cell phone and a small case that I had removed from my pocket that contained my diabetes stuff.

We walked through the machine and reclaimed the stuff from the table. Since my wife's purse had already been inspected, they didn't question it. They did ask me to open my medical case so they could look in it, and I refused. I told them that it contained medical equipment that was none of their business. I pointed out that demanding to see my medical supplies could violate the Americans with Disabilities Act and then walked off.

As soon as we were in the theme park itself, I retrieved the rest of my metallic objects from my wife's purse. Easy as pie.

There is at least one other way of bypassing security. There is a Rainforest Cafe that spans the security station, with a front door on the outside of the "secured" area, and a back door with its own (unmonitored) entrance into the park. Simply enter the Cafe through the front, and then go out the back door, right into the park itself.

Once we got in there, we were faced with LLLOOOONG lines.

Needless to say, we didn't ride any rides. We caught a couple of shows, my wife and I paid $30 for two bottles of water and two chicken gyros, and then we called it a day. At least the weather was pleasant, and we got to spend time with friends that I rarely get to see.