Count me out, Sue.
Let’s start by profiling young Muslim men. What does profile mean? It means making an assumption that all young Muslim men are guilty first, and must prove their innocence before they can be trusted. If you want you can make that assumption only for young Muslim men, I can’t stop you, but count me out.
To test their innocence we will check the background of young Muslim men more closely than the rest of us. What does that mean? It means if you or someone you’re acquainted with knows a lot of young Muslim men, you will be put on a watch list: a list that implies your guilt by association. It means that your phone should be tapped, your email messages scrutinized, your constitutional rights denied. If you think this curtailment of liberty is a reasonable price to pay in the name of increased safety, I can’t stop you, but count me out.
If you have a connection, incidental, accidental or otherwise, with someone whom the State has identified as a terrorist (and the State never makes mistakes, does it) you should be taken in for questioning, held indefinitely, and waterboarded until you confess to everything you know that could stop an attack (or until you make up a story to make the torture stop). If you subscribe to keeping law and order through the adoption of a police state, I can’t stop you, but count me out.
As for me, I’m all for making the airlines safer by spending the money to build and deploy the latest bomb-sniffing equipment to every gate at every airport. I want a system that passes Bibles and Korans without question, but is 100% effective in sniffing out flammable shoes, underwear, or any other belonging a terrorist (Al Queda or otherwise), could conceivably weave into a bomb. And such a system is technologically feasible TODAY. The only reason it’s not being used everywhere is cost and convenience. While we find it completely acceptable to limit the freedom of everyone we think fits the mold of a possible terrorist (i.e doesn’t look or act like us), we find it completely unacceptable to sacrifice a few extra dollars for an airline ticket, or wait an extra hour or two in a security line to guarantee everyone that gets on board is bomb free.
But as we know: our way of life is non-negotiable. We won’t pay extra for our security if it inconveniences US, treats US as guilty until proven innocent. And as for THEM? What kind of radical would treat THEM the same as one of US, as if THEY were our brother? It’s un-American, it sacrifices our national security: it’s letting the terrorists win.
So go ahead, get out the pitchforks, renew the crusade and hunt THEM down, if that’s your wish. But you can count me out.
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Steve, I still think we need a tit for tat format to debate as oppossed to me merely commenting but here goes:
ReplyDeleteLet’s start with the obvious; the definition of profiling is not to determine guilt but to classify. (“a set of characteristics developed for use in identifying persons or things as being likely to belong to a certain group”- (Your Dictionary.com) Does that mean all Muslim men are guilty? No but it certainly might mean that all Muslim men, under the age of 30, traveling without a passport, on a watch list, paying cash for a one way ticket, and with a father who suspects them (and reports them) of radicalization ought to be scrutinized a wee bit more closely.
There is an enormous jump from having protocols in place to be more cautious about those allowed on an airplane and the McCarthyism tactics in which you describe. It is truly an absurd leap you make from additional airport screening to water boarding an acquaintance of a Muslim. Let’s ratchet down the ant-Cheney rhetoric and be realistic. Profiling works when used appropriately (just ask credit card companies who seem to be able to catch more fraudulent purchases simply by having tracking software analyze purchases. Perhaps we ought to use them to factor out the determinant of a terrorist) Llook at the FBI profiling Unit, highly effective as a crime fighting method) But GOD (oops am I allowed to say GOD?) forbid we may hurt someone’s feeling and be politically incorrect by pointing out the fact that ALL of the last terrorists who have tried (and some succeeded) to blow planes out of the sky in America have been Muslim. Should we ignore that fact? And continue to demand that mothers sip their own breast milk at screenings, and my 75yr old mother still have to remove her shoes to be examined all in the name of equality?
It seems unrealistic to believe that we can live in a colorblind, religiously neutral society. Human nature is not that way. We classify people everyday, by how they act, look, dress, talk and behave. Is it always right?, no- as evidenced by the old wives tale, Don’t judge a book by its cover, but is it right much of the time?, I would guess yes. Is it fair? Maybe not, but that’s life. I always find it interesting that the people who most fervently decry the “us vs them’ argument are the ones which put forth the policies which seek to classify (and divide) people in order to ‘protect’ them., Let’s look at Hate crimes laws- it is worse to kill a homosexual man than it is to kill a straight man if your ‘intent’ was to do so because he is gay. How does that make sense? It is a hate crime if the victim was black and the perpetrate white but not vice versa. That seems to accomplish profiling intent in addition to race and other things.
As to loss of freedoms and rights, Somehow I find it ironic that it is so terrible to assume that people who fit in a narrow definition of a “terrorist” (based on the data from the last number of attacks) MAY be wrongly presumed guilty on occasion, but those Americans who wish to exercise their CONSTITUTIONAL rights to purchase a gun, are automatically assumed guilty and MUST have to undergo a background check, often including a mental health history, waiting periods, heavy licensing fines and fees and other “inconveniences” to do so, and yet not a word from those who are so concerned about the former. Shameful actually.
So, until we can spend the money to buy the ideal screening machines that can be completely neutral and 100% effective, if people fit into the profile of a terrorist (based on clear and defined date) have to go through the same inconveniences as gun owners…. COUNT ME IT.
Sue
oh yea, were you as upset over Napolitanos memo regarding the dangers from right wing extremeist and former military personal that came out earlier this year (and lead to increased scrutiny of such greoups despite the lack of evidenace of any problem) or is your outrage only reserved for that profiling which might be politically incorrect?
ReplyDeleteBefore you ask, I was only waterboarded twice before I gave up my cartel of supporters after being identified by the current administration for rantings against this administration on Facebook. (hee hee hee)
Cheers