I've had my right nipple pierced since I was 21 years old and have never encountered this sort of problem. I suspect this could be due to the fact I'm male.
Clearly the officials in this case are lacking in professionalism and tact, demonstrated by their 'snickering' causing this woman obvious and unnecessary distress. One may ask if the request to remove the rings prior to boarding the flight when no removal is required by law was motivated by more base attitudes, similar to some joking comments here. Whilst this is ok in GT, airport security generally does without such ribaldry. And rightly so. Just you try and get one of the officers to have a laugh and see how fast the gloves and KY appear.
