Racial Profiling Of Muslims

I'm sorry if somebody has already said this but i could not go on reading some of the dribble some people were putting forward.
I am white, British and not really religious (sp?). I do agree that these people should be searched, and i know everyone who says so will be branded racist but they are NOT! It is these type of people who are trying to kill innocent people, people just like you and me. That does not make me racist , and the people who do use the racist card on issues like this are just making it more possible for terrorists to carry out these terrible bombings and killings.
Terrorists are cowards and that is a nice way of putting it. And untill the good standing muslims understand that it is the very thing that they know is going on is making things worse for themselves the better, and they can start weeding these wannabe terrorist and will be terrorists out of there comunities and start to make this world a bit more of a safer place to live and then gain back the respect any good human being deserves.

Originally posted by theukman
And untill the good standing muslims understand that it is the very thing that they know is going on is making things worse for themselves the better, and they can start weeding these wannabe terrorist and will be terrorists out of there comunities and start to make this world a bit more of a safer place to live and then gain back the respect any good human being deserves.

Freedom is more important than safety. Not the other way around. The slaves in Rome were pretty safe as long as they did what they were told. Something tells me that they would rather have freedom. When did we forget that? Our grandfathers didn't sacrifce their lives during WWII for us to give up freedom to get a safe plane ride.

Besides, I am afraid there are those who feel that there is no such thing as a Muslim in good standing. Do you know any Muslims? You can't identify a Musilm by his or her looks. Islam is a religion, not a race.

Personally, I am a Christian. What race am I? To know I am Christian, you would need to ask me what religion a believe in. I am at a loss on how the Christians in good standing could possibly weed out the bad Christians, so how could the Muslims do any better?

Perhaps if you went out into your community and got to know people, you may find a way to come together instead of going for each others' throats. I am sure that 99.9% of the people just want to make a living so they can feed their children and families.

Just like any other religion, there are those who would brainwash the weak into doing horrible things that have nothing to do with their faith, even though they are told it is. It is a tragedy plain and simple. The people who carry these attacks out are victims, too. Find the people responsible for brainwashing and training them to get to the truth. These schools must have acceptance and funding or they would be closed down. Where does the money come from? You may not like what you see.

Don't listen to what the media tells you. Open your eyes and do your own research and get the truth. No one can find it for you, You must find it on your own.

Firebrand Islamic academic: 'dying for your beliefs is just'

www.dailymail.co.uk...

A British-based Muslim radical appeared to back suicide bombing yesterday when he claimed that dying for your beliefs was 'just'.

Wait this can not be right.......Islam is the 'religion of peace'...there are no sure things as suicide bombers who blow up innocent men, women and children. Every one they kill is obviously an agent of the west.

and another example.....

www.nytimes.com...

Islamist leaders like Mr. Massari persist, some of them declaring it the duty of British Muslims to kill in the name of Islam.

Mr. Ahmet, a 42-year Briton of Cypriot descent, went on to include bank employees as legitimate targets “because they charge interest,” which he says is in violation of Islamic law.

Yessiree...the 'religion of peace' is at it again.

why are there no moderate muslims standing up to these people?!?



[edit on 21-8-2006 by ferretman2]

originally posted by ferretman2
why are there no moderate muslims standing up to these people?!?

there ARE....plenty....you just dont hear about them. Do you have any idea how many times i have wrote here, condemning these people.....loads of other muslims have too. Do a search on google for "muslims denounce terrorism"....see what you get.
Truth is, there are plenty of muslims who dont agree with using terror, but you just dont hear about them, because lets face it, its not exciting is it?
think about it...two headlines:
"muslim extremists says death to all infidels!"

and

"muslim says....we dont agree with extremists"

which one do ya think will get the attention?

personally, i think muslims need to stop playing the victim, start looking inwards to their own community, stop being so segregated, stop blaming everything on everyone else.....study their religion instead of parrotting what they hear the "imams" preach.....and find Islam for themselves.
(i say this, as a muslim, who has never had, nor never will have, any intention of blowing anything up. Ever)

The problem occurs when the fear being forced on people is resulting in innocent people being affected. The best example is this guy that was forced off the plane by passengers because he was of Asian descent and 'looked fishy'. He no doubt passed security, but because everyone has been bred to fear Arabs, he ended up as the victim.

Is this the next step? All Arabs are to be removed from planes as a preventative measure?

BTW, I posted an image of an old lady, who looked white, with a rocket launcher on her shoulder. I think the post was removed. If this woman was willing to fight and die for her beliefs (whatever they may be, I don't know where the pic came from originally), then another old woman could just as easily be a terrorist. Why not search the oldies?

Since you don't know where the picture came from.....you can't comment and say she is willing to die for her beliefs.

I havn't seen the picture (would like too) but she could be at a gun show or some type of event in that nature.

All I know is that if they start profiling Muslims, every time I fly, I am going to say that I am a Muslim. That security line has got to be shorter than the everybody else's!

I hope this post doesn't get removed.
Edit: If someone could translate her headband that would be great

[edit on 21-8-2006 by Rasobasi420]

omg, i hate this. I hate these kind of pictures. I know that you were trying to make a point, Rasobasi.....i appreciate that fact. But still, i hate these pictures....they go against everything the real Islam stands for.

on a side note.....ferretman2....you asked where were the moderate muslim voices....i replied....and as is usual....the people (you, in this instance) who call for moderate muslim voices,....ignore them when they speak.

I give up

you cannot ask for muslims to speak out and then ignore them when they do. It would be altogether more honest if you just said.....'i dont care if muslims speak out against terrorism....i am still going ahead with my preconceieved ideas about them anyway'

i dont know who it was who said that the art of persuasion is dead.....but they were right.

You have voted geek101 for the Way Above Top Secret award. You have two more votes this month.

thank you,
well said and well put most people here want moderates to speak up but when they do they ignore them, or if they dont see things from their prospectives they arent moderates

Geek, I really hope you understood my point. If I looked, I could find a terrorist of all shapes sizes ages and skin tones. With that, it can totally bump any idea that profiling in this manner will be more effective than actual police work.

There are terrorists of all religions. The most active terrorist groups in America claim to be Christian.

In the current political media climate, Arab Moslem terrorist get the big air time.
I have written elsewhere on this site about my former neighbor who was arrested as a terrorist for buying automatic weapons from an undercover agent.
Since he was Iraqi, Arab and Muslim the local media played this up for weeks. On the other hand, another person, a white christian male who lived on the other side of the airport was arrested after violation of a restraining order, and a subsequent search turned up several pipe bombs, a homemade rocket launcher (that was capable of bringing down a plane, various other home made weapons, and several jars of ricin. He got a 5-minute blurb on the 6:00 news.

The real question here is how do you profile an Arab Moslem. Most people in America think Arabs are olive-skinned, with black curly hair, and speak with an accent. The problem with that is twofold, First, the Arab stereotype can also apply to Indians, Greeks, Isrealis, Italians, and anyone with ancestry from those regions. A good example of an Arab-American that fits the stereotype is Jamie Farr, (of course the accent is from Toledo, Ohio)
The second problem with stereotypes are that they often don't apply at all. One Palestinian that I know, who happens to be a Naturalized Us citizen, is tall, light complected with read hair, and Christian. In fact, the Iraqi neighbor that was arrested, was often assumed to be from East Europe, because he was obviously white.
A list of Arab-Americans, many of whom do not fit the stereotype appearance is at
www.aaiusa.org...
You will be surprised about many of them.

Also, the vast majority of Muslim are not terrorists, however, the media gives more airtime to the few that are. Imagine for a moment, that the tables were turned. Image that you entire knowledge of Christainanity was limited to news programs showing Christians dancing with Snakes, burning crosses, and killing people for their race or non-Christian Beliefs. Would you believe for a moment that Christians based their faith on love? Not hardly.
So why pick on Arab Moslems? In an interview on making the Movie "Syriana" George Clooney remarked about having to learn a few phrases in Arabic. He said that what made it difficult was that Arabic was so different from European languages. The fact is that most Americans knowledge is what the media tells us. We accept it blindly because in an absence of information, we accept the first source as authoritative. This is a common precept of brain-washing. The second precept is that people will believe whatever they hear the most. They then become willing to accept any lies that the authortative source feeds them, as long as it can be made to fit into the web of lies.

Originally posted by curme
All I know is that if they start profiling Muslims, every time I fly, I am going to say that I am a Muslim. That security line has got to be shorter than the everybody else's!

Hahahaha! You will have to let me sig that!

Bodrul......thank you for that. Its true though isnt it?...i have noticed that those who ask that question, are always the ones who will ignore the response. It just seems wholly unfair to me, but i guess thats life


Rasobasi.....i totally got your point, it is just depressing to see pictures like that. Its so far from the Islam i have studied. But yes, i did understand what you were doing and you did make your point well

Niklaus.....very good post. I myself know an Egyptian muslim whose skin colour is the same as mine (white)...added to that, when i first heard him speak, i was convinced he was Irish, cos the accent sounded similar...

Your post is carrying on from what Rasobasi was saying, in a way....just as he was pointing out that terrorists come in all shapes and sizes, so do muslims.
No-one would think i am a muslim if they saw me. I wear western dress (trousers, t-shirts, etc), i dont wear scarf on my head, and i am white. People are surprised when they find out i am a muslim.

Ironically enough, if all those muslims who believe in Sharia law actually followed it properly, they would all be dressed in exactly the same way, which would make it pretty damn easy to profile them...lol

That picture looks photoshopped. Poor granny...that's awful.

:shk:

Originally posted by dgtempe
That picture looks photoshopped.

Poor granny...that's awful.

:shk:

I think it clearly is photoshopped, note the blurs around the contour of her body/weapon/etc. what's your source?

The only thing I noticed odd about the granny with the RPG is that the image appears to be reversed. Arabic is written and read from right to left with capitalization on the right side of words.

In strict Islamic fundamentalist societies, married women cover their faces in public, single women do not. Also, a Moslem woman must be escorted by a male member of her family except when in gatherings attended only by women and/or children, such as services at a mosque. The old lady in the photo appears (by her dress) to be a nun, possibly a Mother Superior, who by virtue of being a virgin, would not be required to cover her face in public.

I may be mistaken, but I seem to recall that RPG launchers have a small plexi shield attached to protect the users face from the hot rocket exhaust. If that is the case then it has been removed from this one, indicating the scene is probably staged, but I dont see evidence of it being faked.

Someone earlier in this thread stated that Arabs are black. A common misconception is that the Middle East is part of Africa. Actually the area was formerly called Asia Minor.
Beyond that point, Islam is a religion, not a race. I guess you could screen the passengers with the new x-ray equipment to see if the guys are circumcised, but then you would be detaining a lot of non Islam peope as well.

Originally posted by thelibra
What I hope to have just demonstrated is that just because anyone can be a terrorist, it is foolish to ignore statistical data that proves over and over that the majority of your suspects will fall in the overlap between Circle A and Circle B.

Thank you for putting it together in a clear and balanced manner.

Separately, to Rasputin13 -- it might be the only time when I agree with your post 100%. You are right. I've seen more than once that elderly women (on airport-supplied wheelchairs, which should be secure anyway) are subjected to a thorough search, there shoes removed and all. I also got the impression that it's done to enhance the apparent randomness in searches and doesn't really serve any useful purpose. Every time you search a frail old lady, you let some other person fo unchecked, who is statistically more likely to commit an act of terrorism. Since these attacks are obviously a numbers game, I don't see why we should neglect the statistics.



[edit on 22-8-2006 by Aelita]

As an Italian American, let me tell you this. If Italians were committing acts of terror against the U.S. at home and abroad, I would not only expect, but I would DEMAND, that airport screeners take extra caution and pay close attention to Italian men when screening them. As a passenger on a given flight, I would feel much more safe knowing that the TSA agents carefully screened all the Italian men on my flight. I'd be even more pleased if they screened everyone that even closely resembled an Italian man- even the Italian women with extraordinarily hairy upper lips! I think that any sensible Arab man or Muslim man should feel the same way. By taking a closer look at these folks, or "profiling" as some of you like to call it, they are not only protecting us from acts of terror but also protecting the very same Arab and/or Muslim men that they are screening from acts of terror!

Rasputin13 - Excellent post. Congratulation!!! You have actually said it. This is one of the best viewpoints I have seen on ATS.

All I have to say to that is something that someone a lot wiser than I asaid a long time ago

"Those who would sacrifice essential liberties for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Benjamin Franklin