Well played!

Remember that film Meet The Parents? Towards the end of the film, when Ben Stiller's Greg Focker character was preparing to fly back to his home state, he tried to take his over-sized luggage on board the plane only to be told by a flight attendant that his bag was too big and so it had to be checked in. Focker refused to hand over his bag and angrily told them, 'It's not like I've got a bomb in here!' Having said the dreaded 'B' word on a plane full of passengers, he was escorted off the plane and interrogated by security who believed he was a terrorist just because he said the word 'bomb' on an airplane.

Something similar occured in Los Angeles earlier last week. Two British tourists, Leigh Van Bryan and Emily Bunting were detained by armed guards upon landing in Los Angeles thanks to a twitter faux-pas made by Van Bryan in which he claimed that he and Bunting were going to 'destroy America' and dig up Marilyn Monroe's corpse. As a result, they were considered potential terrorist threats by the Department of Homeland Security and locked up in a jail cell with a Mexican drug dealer for 12 hours. They were also interrogated and had their passports confiscated.

The pair told officials that 'destroy' was British slang for party and that Van Bryan's tweet was meant to imply that he and Bunting were going to live it up in Los Angeles. Van Bryan also claimed that officials searched his belongings for spades and shovels in case he really meant to dig up Monroe's corpse and that he was being treated as some sort of terrorist.

Well, what can I say? Given that the US has been on high alert for terrorist threats since September 11, I don't think it is a wise idea to use the words 'going to destroy' in the same sentence as America. Ok, I understand that Van Bryan wanted to brag to his friends about partying hard in the US, but he could have chosen his words more carefully. What's wrong with just simply stating, 'We're gonna rip it up here in the States' or 'Gonna paint the town red' or simply, 'Hollywood here I come!!!!' Any of those would've been fine. But apparently it wasn't 'epic' enough for Mr. Van Bryan. And as if to make his oh-so-exciting trip much more exhilirating, he decided to add some quote from Family Guy that involved digging up Marilyn Monroe's corpse. Well, what can I say? I guess he got so carried away with going on this trip that all manner of Internet etiquette was thrown out the window. That, or he's an idiot. If he had any sense of tact left in his brain he should have known that the US takes such matters seriously.

You know, this is one of the problems in the modern world. Some people get so caught up with bragging about an upcoming moment in their life that not only do they feel the need to shove it down others' throats, but they also try to make it much bigger than it really is by digging into their bag of overstatements and coming up with a sentence that might make an event seem impressive, but could also inadvertently land them into trouble. Maybe it won't be as extreme as what Van Bryan did but such behaviour could be seen as arrogant and could make others jealous or cast the poster seem snobby. Someone might view the message and think, 'This punk thinks that just because he/she is going to some place they must be better than me!' Not a pretty thought, is it?

Van Bryan and Bunting were eventually cleared of any bad intentions and were released. But they didn't end up going on that quest to 'destroy America' after all. They were driven back to the airport and then flown back home. Well played, guys. Absolute humiliation thanks to your lack of common sense and you get treated like criminals and ultimately sent home for your troubles. Talk about a waste of time, effort, money and hyperbole. Perhaps in the future you will think before you post and choose your words carefully. We live in a world where some people will take what you say seriously, even if you were joking or speaking in slang.