A man flying from Heathrow, London was recently told he could not board a flight wearing a t-shirt depicting a cartoon robot holding a gun.

An even more extreme case from 2006 was a man flying from John F Kennedy airport was refused boarding while wearing a t-shirt with the slogan “we will not be silent” in both English and Arabic.

My concern is any public statement can be suppressed if the forum of discussion is controlled by a private interests. We effectively sign away certain rights when we take a flight, go to the cinema, enter a shopping centre, visit someone’s home or comment on Facebook. We should choose companies that don’t ask for fundamental rights to be surrendered. If we cannot practically choose from alternatives, as with airports, our rights should be protected from the airport operator company.

Anti Citizen One

PS What is stopping the airlines demanding that no one wears the colour green on flights?