posted
Actually, Brian, I don't think Ann Coulter would say that the Pope is Catholic. Maybe she'd say that Catholics eat babies, I don't know.
My favorite Ann Coulter quotes:
quote:"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war."
in her column on 9/13/01
quote:"God gave us the earth. We have dominion over the plants, the animals, the trees. God said, 'Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It's yours.'"
on Hannity & Colmes
quote:To a disabled Vietnam vet: "People like you caused us to lose that war."
on MSNBC
quote:"I have to say I'm all for public flogging. One type of criminal that a public humiliation might work particularly well with are the juvenile delinquents, a lot of whom consider it a badge of honor to be sent to juvenile detention. And it might not be such a cool thing in the 'hood to be flogged publicly."
on MSNBC
quote:"The swing voters---I like to refer to them as the idiot voters because they don't have set philosophical principles. You're either a liberal or you're a conservative if you have an IQ above a toaster. "
on Beyond the News, Fox News Channel
Posts: 1681 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
There seem to have been a number of spats recently on the board that involve name-calling, etc. Is everyone just grumpy, or are we all becoming rude?
quote:You need to read before mouthing off. She not only cites Coulter as a source, but even links to Coulter's site.
You need to read before mouthing off. I didn't say she didn't cite Coulter. I said the source for the two-Arab limit wasn't Coulter. It was someone testifying before the 9/11 commission.
quote:I said the source for the two-Arab limit wasn't Coulter. It was someone testifying before the 9/11 commission.
Yeah, and I already pointed out that Lehman also believes that the US is in a holy war with Islamic fundementalists. Nice source.
You're really funny. You absolutely refuse to ever admit that you could be wrong in these discussions. The author describes a situation where she is suspicious, which turns out to be innocent, and yet she persists in writing from the assumption of Arabs doing practice runs for terrorists.
For everyone else who reads the article, be sure to note that in the author's account, the men she is describing turn out to be innocent.
[ July 20, 2004, 05:58 PM: Message edited by: Jutsa Notha Name ]
Posts: 1170 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
Actually, the author admits that there's a possible explenation other than a dry run for their actions. She doesn't say that's clearly the reason, nor that it clearly isn't. Personally I think she is biased, and it probably wasn't a dry run, but calling the author racist and inflammatory doesn't change the fact that even if they weren't terrorist, the actions they took could've been used to conduct a terrorist attack, nor should it dismiss the question, if these actions can take place on a plane without actual reaction (instead of observation) are we really prepared for a time when those same actions are used to create a real bomb, or to storm the cockpit, or whatever you could do with the freedom adn planning this anecdote seemd to exhibit?
quote:You're really funny. You absolutely refuse to ever admit that you could be wrong in these discussions. The author describes a situation where she is suspicious, which turns out to be innocent, and yet she persists in writing from the assumption of Arabs doing practice runs for terrorists.
And you're the one who's leaped from this to "She's racist!"
Thank God you weren't around in McCarthy's time.
Dagonee Edit: And it's not that I never admit I'm wrong. I just refuse to admit that your shallow and premature assessments of others are correct.
posted
Hobbes, did you read the article? The 14 men not only had nothing to implicate them, including no prior offenses or connections with terrorist groups, but the authorities let them go. They weren't just probably innocent, they were definitely and officially innocent.
Posts: 1170 | Registered: Jan 2003
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I'm not saying what I think the men's intentions were, I was pointing out what the author thought their intentions could be. Since your statement was about the author's perception of what they were doing, I was simply pointing out that she actually never said she felt that they weren't terrorists, and that their actions still seemed suspicious to her.
posted
I wish they had given their names so I could write one in for governor of Utah this november. Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
quote [Justa]: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- But where is the evidence that these were all buddies? --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
quote[article]: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The 14 Syrians had been hired as musicians to play at a casino in the desert. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some of them came in together, some separately, but they were co-workers, at least. Plus, they were standing around in groups around the lavatories, and talking to each other.
And there may have not been 'weird behavior' by non-Arabic passengers on that particular flight. I used to fly a LOT and the wierdest thing I ever saw was a terrified passenger clutching a rosary while the noisome (and drunk) businessman next to me told plane crash stories and tried to buy me drinks.
She did sort of describe the other passengers' behavior a little-- at least one other woman was scared shiteless.
This may very well have been a case of paranoia, but I don't think the investigation was unwarranted, either. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sorry to repeat myself, but this article illustrates something important that we are all missing-- that it would be exceedingly easy for a group of people to assemble a bomb or whatever on a plane.
Maybe the writer seems racist I think she experienced something that scared the holy heck out of her, and wants to believe there is a way to prevent people from assembling a bomb in an airplane lavatory.
I really don't think there is.
Should we automatically ignore suspicious behavior on airplanes? Good golly, no. Are Americans in general a bit more sensitive to suspicious behavior of Arab-looking people after 9/11? You betcha. Should we strip-search every Arab-looking person who wants to fly? Heck no.
But the very fact that the 9/11 terrorists were young Arabs... well, people being what they are, tht knowledge is going to generate some fear and suspicion of people who look a certain way.
That may be racist, but I'd rather call it human nature. Just because it's natural and understandable doesn't make it RIGHT, mind you. I just don't think it makes it racist either. It's fear based, not hate based.
Posts: 1664 | Registered: Apr 2004
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posted
Racism isn't hate based. Hate is a product of racism, or the act of it. Racism is totally a fear based thing. Her fears were unreasonably based on judging solely from the criteria of what she considers normal. As I already pointed out, most of the behavior described seemed fairly normal to me, and I'm not even from another country.
Her account of what happened (as opposed to what really was), along with the account according to Eunice Stone with the few Arab fellows in Florida, along with other related incidents throughout the United States (and reported via the Justice Dept.), is an example of racism that has swelled since 9/11. There are loads more incidents that never involve the FBI, because it is just discriminatory behavior to those of Arabic descent. Throughout the course of that article, all that is covered is an examination of policies and events through the eyes of a scared white person. Even when told of similar incidents by friends, even one that made a national news radio broadcast (NPR), she still approached it as if there were terrorist cells in the US training to assemble bombs. She gave no evidence of there being any in the US, but used foreign warnings as her only red flag. Everything she used to suggest the possibility required a stretch of the imagination, strengthened only by her terrified account of what turned out to be 14 musicians on a trip in a foreign country.
What baffles me is that some of you are defending it as reasonable, rational thinking. Is it because she obviously knows how to write well? She definitely has a flair for dramatic prose, and knows how to use sentences. Do we inherently associate the term "racist" with "stupid" and "uneducated" in the back of our minds? After all, how could an educated person have such a prejudice?
This author isn't the next Hitler, nor do I think her article is going to result in a new slew of internment camps throughout the nation. What it does seem to do is provide a basis for validation of the habit we, as human beings, tend to have with regard to treating something we don't understand as a threat. She is obviously attributing all strange (to her) or suspicious (to her) behavior as terroristic in the article, at least when it comes to such behavior coming from Arab men. You say she is just talking about airline security, though her closing statement itself equates the fourteen innocent musicians to the 19 hijackers of 9/11. The only similarity is that they come from the same region of the world (not even the same nation).
If one assumes every black person with a cell phone or beeper is a drug dealer, would you call that racist? If one assumes that every latino who speaks Spanish around them is discussing them, would you call that racist? Where exactly does the threshold lie? At what point does something go from being ethnically-based bias to becoming racist?
Posts: 1170 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
I said it was reasonable to expect the reaction she had, and I think it is understandable. I don't think it is necessarily rational or logical thinking (if she was thinking at all in the advanced state of fear she was in), I just don't think that makes her a racist.
Fear leads to anger, anger leads to the DARK SIDE.
I think calling for ethnic profiling is a bad move, I agree with that. I tend to think that the writer was sort of grasping at straws, trying to come up with a way to prevent a bomb actually being assembled on a flight (in the manner we have had warnings about). I don't think that solution would work, though.
And, yeah, I know I could do a lot of those same things with friends of mine on a plane and probably not arouse suspicion (unless maybe I wore a head scarf-- I doo look sort of Middle-Eastern, I have been told).
I think the things you mention about discrimination and bad treatment of American Muslims/Arabs and Arab visitors is bad. Racist, yes. Unexpected after 9/11? No.
Example:
We recently adopted a stray dog. She's super sweet with the boys and very loving. She was very shy around Ron and very submissive around him. She seems to be afraid of grown men. So far, ALL grown men. Ron has never been anything but gentle with her, though he does speak commands with authority.
Anyway, we believe she was abused, most likely by a grown male. She has occasionally nipped at other grown males, who were only trying to be friendly. That isn't rational behavior. But it IS understandable by a reasonable person. It's a hindbrain response-- this person looks like the bad person who hurt me, I must be cautious. Fight or Flight.
Not the height of rationality, but an understandable survival mechanism.
posted
We are not dogs. Being thinking, rationalizing human beings, we should be able to work past those knee-jerk reactions. Even moreso when people show us examples contrary to what we thought, and when experience itself shows that our thoughts were, in fact, unfounded. This is why I called the article racist: her own experience turned out to be unfounded, her colleagues gave her similarly unfounded incidents, yet she persisted to assert that Arab men are not being screened adequately for her.
I can see understanding why she thinks that way, but I refuse to consider it acceptable.Posts: 1170 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
I thought two things as I read that article:
1. Would the author have been so concerned if 14 white middle aged business men in suits got on the plane and proceeded to carry out all the behaviour she described? How about 14 Asian-Americans? 14 Italians? More to the point, would she have been watching those groups especially even before any suspicous behaviour occured?
2. If I were planning any attack in the wake of 9/11, I wouldn't use people of a distinctively middle-eastern appearance. I certainly wouldn't have my operatives dress in arabic tracksuits. The key would be to blend in as much as possible.
And maybe a third (based partially on some of the stories in this thread): US Airport and airline security scares me. Scared me before 9/11 when my bags flew separately from me on several occasions within the US, when I carried (unthinkingly) several banned articles aboard, and even now with all the 'improvements' I still think its woefully inadequate.
Which is why if I'm flying to the US I always fly Qantas, or at a pinch BA. Internal flights I grit my teeth and cope with.
Posts: 4393 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
I never said it was acceptable. I said it was understandable.
We aren't dogs, but we aren't robots, either. The flesh still carries traces of those instincts that have allowed our species to survive. You can't change millions of years of evolution overnight. It would probably be counter-productive anyway.
It's racist to assume all Arab people are terrorists. But it is naive to assert that a young male of Middle-Eastern origin is not any more likely to be a terrorist than, say, a cheerleader from Des Moines.
The English were probably more likely to be suspicious of Irishmen (as opposed to Welshmen or Americans), what with all the attacks that arose from the situation in Northern Ireland. I don't think that's terribly unreasonable, considering.
I prettymuch agree with you on every single significant point, I just think the jump to shouting "Racist!" is every bit as emotional as this woman's fear of what turned out to be a somewhat more benign situation than she had thought.
Posts: 1664 | Registered: Apr 2004
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posted
Imogen-- That is exactly the point I was trying to make. If somebody wants to blow up a plane, they can do it, no question. THAT's what scares me. I think racial profiling, or whatever is beside the point. A distressed individual grasping at straws to find something to 'make it okay.'
Security is a joke in most American airports. Harrassing Arabic people won't change that.
Posts: 1664 | Registered: Apr 2004
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quote: Just kind of wanted to get Hatrack's reaction. It's about a woman who believes she may have witnessed a dry run for a bombing on a recent Northwest Airlines flight, and the relevant security procedures that did not prevent or address the situation.
I am guessing that the air marshalls in the article didn't want to precipitate a situation and were keeping an eye on the men. I imagine actually pulling a gun on a crowded plane in an attempt to subdue someone is the last thing that you want to do. You pull a gun and fire, where does the bullet end up? If you don't kill all the terrorists, then what about the ones left that you don't get? They are going to throw caution to the wind and will probably start taking lives indiscriminately.
Worse, what if they weren't terrorists and an air marshall opens fire?
I imagine, in my completely unqualified opinion, that the authorities would want to wait until the plane was on the ground before they jumped on these guys and that they would only want to do something on the plane in the event that they absolutely had to. I think the fact that the FBI had those Syrian passports indicates that this is, in fact, what happened.
I think the air marshalls did the right thing.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
Oh, I don't know Olivetta. Those Des Moines Cheerleaders are pretty hardcore.
Seriously, I do agree with you.
I think the answer lies in better screening of *everyone*. Even if they are blonde and cute. Sure it would cost more - but I for one wouldn't be opposed to paying more for air travel if I knew the result was a comprehensive screening and security system.
Posts: 4393 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
As an aside, I think it's a pretty sad state of affairs that things have come to this. That when boarding a plane, a little bit of you does look around and think "Is one of these people going to try and kill me and all these other people?".
And worse, that fear is founded in a real possibility. A very statistically small possibility, but one that exists nonetheless.
Posts: 4393 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
By the way, if those guys were terrorists, they had to have been the stupidest terrorists in the world to have broadcast the fact that they were Middle Eastern. I can't imagine that when they went through airport security that they wouldn't have been scrutinized very heavilly and searched. Perhaps it's racist, but it's just a fact of life that Middle Eastern men have negative connotations for many people.
I just can't believe that they were terrorists. Any terrorist with two working brain cells would have worn casual attire to blend in, not suits with Arabic writing on them as the woman says they had.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
Exactly. [edit to add I was talking to Imogen, though I agree with SS that a flashing neon sign reading "I'm a terrorist" was all they were missing. It almost sounds like a game of 'let's freak the Americans' If it was, I'd say it was nuthin but net]
The scariest thing is, I know that if I could recruit a bunch of the Wenches, we could probably slip into the lavatory with our handbags and assemble something really devastating. Like a model of Helms Deep constructed out of toothpicks, feminine hygene products and bubble gum.
posted
It was already established in the first link that they were not terrorists, just simple musicians flown there on a job. This little fact was already lost on most.
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