Immigration officer’s citizenship question out of line?

Question: After returning to Los Angeles from a round-trip cruise to Hawaii by way of Ensenada, Mexico, we handed our U.S. passports to an immigration officer and were taken aback when he asked us what our citizenship was. We are American citizens of Asian origin and have traveled the world. Was the officer out of line?

--Philip G. Reamon, Glendale

Answer: There’s really no right or easy answer to this question, only more questions. Among them:

* Was Reamon too sensitive?

* Was the officer’s question insensitive?

* Does your answer depend on your ethnicity?

* Is it OK to risk offending people for the sake of national security?

* Do we operate under an assumption of evil intent -- that is, that others want to annoy and harass us because they can?

* Is the line between civility and incivility so blurred that we no longer can tell what falls out of bounds?

* And finally, most important, would someone else like to answer this question?

Because I cannot.

In talking with Reamon, I learned that he has been to 102 countries, so he’s hardly a novice traveler, but this was the first time this had happened to him.

In talking with Kelly Klundt, a spokeswoman for Customs and Border Protection, I learned that about 1.1 million people come into the country each day through 327 airports, land ports and seaports. About half are U.S. citizens.

In talking with colleagues of Asian descent, I learned that they’re asked often if they’re Americans. Sometimes it rankles.

In talking with Nico Melendez, a spokesman for the Transportation Security Administration who is of Latino descent, I learned that security staff at the U.S.-Mexico border recently opened the back of his car to ask his kids whether Melendez and his wife were their parents. It’s not an insult, he said; it’s part of keeping the country safe.

In talking with BJ Gallagher, a diversity consultant and coauthor of the book “A Peacock in the Land of Penguins,” I learned that people judge themselves by their own intentions but rarely give others the same consideration.

And in talking with people everywhere, I’ve learned that, yes, civility seems to be dying a slow, ugly death.

Was this another body blow or was it a blow for national security?

Who can say?

Have a travel dilemma? Write to travel@latimes.com.