Right. Yeah I didn’t engage my brain on the & initially as i thought it was just a typo. But that should work, seems others on the internet think the same.

I like ‘exec startx’, but really if someone has physical access, unless you are doing a lot of other security, you can’t be safe.

If you switch to the VT with Ctrl-Alt-F1, and hit ctrl-z the process is suspended, but does not complete so it never gets to the exit.

At least that is my suspicion. I’m going to try it when I’m in front of a machine.

Joke’s on you. Ctrl-Alt-F1 Ctrl-z.