UK Police Arresting People Just To Add To DNA Database?

The question on the form used to be "Have you ever been convicted of a felony?" but after 9/11 the question was changed to "Have you ever been arrested?".

Whether you were convicted is irrelevant, and the only exception is for traffic offences.

The details are here: http://www.usembassy.org.uk/cons_new/visa/niv/vwp3.html

  Important: Some travelers may not be eligible to enter the United States visa free
  under the VWP. These include people who have been arrested, even if the
  arrest did not result in a criminal conviction, those with criminal records,
  (the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act does not apply to U.S. visa law), certain
  serious communicable illnesses, those who have been refused admission into,
  or have been deported from, the United States, or have previously overstayed on
  the VWP. Such travelers must apply for special restricted visas. If they attempt
  to travel without a visa, they may be refused entry into the United States.

So if you actually were convicted, then you're pretty much screwed. But an arrest without conviction creates a very high artificial barrier (months of delay and financial cost) to entry and a very powerful tool for the authorities.

I now choose not to participate in any form of public protest or demonstration for fear that actions by others that might result in disorder could lead me to be arrested and harm my work and private life in the future.

I have changed my behaviour as a result of reading an article on Dr Andrew Feldmar: http://thetyee.ca/News/2007/04/23/Feldmar/

Here is a man denied entry to the US for taking a drug in a different country, that was legal at the time, as part of psychological research.Dr Feldmar concluded in another article of that time (which I can't find to quote) that his real crime was in not having the imagination to understand the world in which he now lived.

If a man can be judged, without a jury, and penalised for actions in the past that were legal at the time in a different country altogether, then this world is not the one I thought it was and I realise that the only protection I can offer myself it to acknowledge what this world actually is.

I don't think any of the airport security circus works any more. People just answer the questions to get past the bureaucracy.

It's like other things in life though - when I call up ADSL support, they start with "Are you using windows". If you answer 'no', they say they don't support anything else. So I answer yes so that I'll at least get through to the next stage of bureaucracy.

Feel free to downvote, but I'd be even more interested in assertions that all is well, there have been no noteworthy changes in the world from a compliance or enforcement of existing rules perspective.