

‘JFK Customs destroyed 11 of my instruments’ - mikegirouard
http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2013/12/jfk-customs-destroyed-11-of-my-instruments.html

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noonespecial
The biggest problem is that there doesn't seem to be any professional risk
when customs agents "get it wrong". It seems that the agent could decided that
your Sony Walkman is an agricultural product and take it from you and there
will be shrugs all around.

With no downside whatsoever for overstepping bounds, added with the kinds of
people that are attracted to this sort of job, its almost inevitable that
bored agents will start hassling people when things get slow.

~~~
kaonashi
There's plenty of professional risk, but it's all present in going outside the
lines. One of the first casualties of the terrorism scare was the ability of
public employees to exercise common sense.

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ta43434
The (world famous) pianist Krystian Zimerman also had his concert grand
destroyed by customs while on tour:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krystian_Zimerman#Criticism_of_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krystian_Zimerman#Criticism_of_US_policy)

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binarymax
Bamboo instruments are agricultural products. So are the cotton and wool
clothing I am wearing.

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bonemachine
This country is doomed.

Even during the cold war, in all the slapstick portrayals in movies and and
sitcoms, you would never see Soviet (or Nazi) border or other guard types
acting anywhere near as stupid as the CBP officers in this case.

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Turing_Machine
This was Customs, not TSA.

But yeah, I agree.

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bonemachine
Fixed. Thanks.

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blhack
I wonder who actually made the call to destroy these things? Does an
individual customs agent have the authority to do this?

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sp332
Looks like CBP's own guidelines explicitly allow dried bamboo products.
[https://help.cbp.gov/app/answers/detail/a_id/1359/~/importin...](https://help.cbp.gov/app/answers/detail/a_id/1359/~/importing-
bamboo-into-the-us)

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vishaldpatel
A greencard is not just an employment permit. It is a permit to stay here
permanently.

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YCbannedIP
What are the chances this action was retaliatory, perhps in response to some
political idea that someone in US Government didn't like?

What are the chances this is not the case? Pretty slim if you ask me, based on
my expirences with TSA.

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lyndonh
Every country has export/import regulations at their borders. They usually
don't check that what you take out is permissable to bring back in.

If he didn't have the proper documentation or follow the rules, he's only got
himself to blame. We'll have to wait for the whole story to come out.

~~~
ryguytilidie
Huh? I genuinely do not understand posts like this at all. You're blaming a
musician for trying to bring an instrument into the US with the expectation
that customs not break it for no reason? As someone else posted, bamboo
products are explicitly allowed
([https://help.cbp.gov/app/answers/detail/a_id/1359/~/importin...](https://help.cbp.gov/app/answers/detail/a_id/1359/~/importing-
bamboo-into-the-us)), but hey, why understand details or have compassion when
you can just side with the government mindlessly at every opportunity...

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lyndonh
What I said was if he didn't follow the rules then he's only got himself to
blame. If he had followed the rules then he has been wronged. I didn't
mindlessly side with the government but I did read the article.

If YOU had read the article then you would have known from the lack of detail
it wasn't clear exactly what happened or why. The musician in question didn't
seem to fight the customs agent which suggests to me that he acknowledged he
had made a mistake.

You should also know from reading the article that it didn't say customs broke
his instruments; they confiscated them (for destruction). But hey, it sounds a
lot more exciting and outrageous to say they broke them.

I guess you mindlessly sided against the government. Chill out.

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powera
Why do people keep reflexively voting up any story about "Customs does
something bad"? There's nothing particularly interesting or hacking-related
here, it seems some people just want to promote the view that customs is out
of control.

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ryguytilidie
"promote the view"

Do you not believe that they are actually out of control? Breaking peoples
stuff for no good reason and basically telling them to fuck off seems pretty
out of control to me.

How you could think there is nothing interesting about the people we pay to
make our country safe going out of their way to cause harm is pretty far
beyond my comprehension really.

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powertower
Do you really think you got the whole story in that blog post which itself
admits it has no details about what happened?

~~~
mikegirouard
Certainly not. This was an update from the artist who had this happen to him.
A prior article is here:
[http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2013/12/outrage-at-
jf...](http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2013/12/outrage-at-jfk-as-
customs-men-smash-flutes.html)

The parent article doesn't say much either, but I take it that the event
happened, people are upset and the story is developing.

