Slashdot Mirror
Don't Fly During Ramadan
An anonymous reader sends in a harrowing story from Aditya Mukerjee about his recent attempt to fly from New York to Los Angeles. After being pulled aside in the security line, he faced hours of interrogation by uncommunicative officials from several different agencies. When he was finally cleared, his airline, Jet Blue, wouldn't let him on the plane anyway. When he got home, he found evidence that it had been searched. He writes,
"It was 2:20PM by the time I was finally released from custody. My entire body was shaking uncontrollably, as if I were extremely cold, even though I wasn’t. I couldn’t identify the emotion I was feeling. Surprisingly, as far as I could tell, I was shaking out of neither fear nor anger - I felt neither of those emotions at the time. The shaking motion was entirely involuntary, and I couldn’t force my limbs to be still, no matter how hard I concentrated. In the end, JetBlue did refund my flight, but they cancelled my entire round-trip ticket. Because I had to rebook on another airline that same day, it ended up costing me about $700 more for the entire trip. .. But no matter how I’ve tried to rationalize this in the last week and a half, nothing can block out the memory of the chilling sensation I felt that first morning, lying on my air mattress, trying to forget the image of large, uniformed men invading the sanctuary of my home in my absence, wondering when they had done it, wondering why they had done it."
Why you ask? Because despite your bigotry, if you had read the article you would have noticed the guy is Hindu.
Didn't read the article, did you?
The author's not a muslim, and even if he had been, his treatment was asinine.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Hey, America,
Are you proud of yourself yet? Proud of what you've become to yourself, your citizens and to the rest of the world?
no.
Um, no. The Talmud doesn't say that. You should probably stop reading Neo-Nazi and Jihadist websites.
Yes, a huge percentage of Americans are actually quite proud of the version of the USA that exists in their heads. Just letting you know.
Another agent came over and handed me a paper slip
Notice that he's already receiving different treatment, despite absolutely zero evidence that he's any kind of threat to anyone.
“You can leave, but I’m keeping your bag.”
Something that would have been interesting to try at this point: "Ok, then. I presume there's a procedure for handling bags you've collected in this fashion, let's fill out the necessary paperwork and do everything by the book, and I'll need to be kept informed about which office to contact for retrieving such evidence once you've discovered that there's nothing criminal about it."
“What is your religion?”
This whole line of questioning is so obviously in violation of the Free Exercise clause it's not even funny.
I am officially gone from
It is about numbers. You can read books by Muslim women talking about what they see as dominant trends in their culture, in places like Egypt, Gaza, and where Islamic culture spreads to Europe and America. It isn't as simple as "extremists are a tiny minority". I also see it personally with friends who come from Muslim families -- despite being born in the West, they cannot extricate themselves from the old culture without being completely ostracised from their family. Many would rather conform than leave. And to do it they'll live a double life. Anyway like I say, read what Moslem women like Nonie Darwish, Ghazal Omid, Qanta Ahmed.
A sample from Darwish: "We often hear that “moderate” Muslims are the majority and that terrorist supporters are a minority fringe group. However, when genuine Islamic moderate leaders stand firm against terrorism, we do not see majority Muslim support for their views. To the contrary, such “moderates” shout the speakers down, condemn, and threaten them."
Anyway this is a separate point to racial profiling by security services.
If you had actually read the article, you would have noticed that he's not Islamic, and not an Arab.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Yes, you idiot. The passage you quote is Rabbi Yochanan being slapped down for saying something stupid and wrong.
The converse that all terrorists are Muslim is a common sense generalization, however.
All Terrorists are Muslims... Except the 94% that Aren't
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
What the heck are you one about?
The bible is a collection of stories, what stories go in it is decided by each branch of christianity. They vary quite a bit. The constitution is one document written at one time and not a collection of oral traditions only written down centuries later.
I would say less than 30 years ago this was true. Now, not so much.
I was thinking the same thing. The country as it is today is, in my opinion, not much of something to be proud of. The government is blatantly corrupt, people that are woefully uninformed are electing the wrong people into government (or electing anyone at all for the wrong reasons), and one cannot travel quickly within the country without having basic rights violated.
It's pretty sad when the American government makes likes of Vladimir Putin look like a "good guy".
When politicians are involved, everyone loses.
The terrorists exist, and you've probably seen them already (on the news or in other media). They're a small fringe group whose members are, by and large, not particularly competent or capable. They got extremely lucky once, but even counting that, they're about as much of a threat to individuals, the United States, or civilization in general as home accidents and bad weather.
One of the best descriptions I can recall reading of terrorists was along the lines of, "criminals who want to be warriors". Terror is probably best handled in a low-key manner by law enforcement. The "War on Terra" has given them exactly what they want, and was probably the worst possible response. America's over-reaction to 9/11 and the terrorism "threat" in general is doing far, far more damage than any terrorist could directly do in their wildest dreams.
Minor bitch:
Reign in the NSA? Should be our top priority.
Rein, not Reign (w/ the g it means "to rule over")
That's all, have a great weekend - hope it doesn't rain.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Oh, then we can have the southern 20 nations re-implement Jim Crow. Face facts: localized government has done even worse by most measures than the federal government.
How many of those countries have an NDAA and allow their citizens to be militarily imprisoned without a trial?
How many of those countries have a "constitution free" zone that covers most of their population?
How many of those countries have continue to hold innocent prisoners cleared for release a la Gitmo?
How many of those countries have openly assassinated one of their citizens for engaging in protected speech?
You're either snarking the shit out of us, have limited to your travels to places like Saudi Arabia and Egypt, or have a terminal case of American Exceptionalism.
I know! That's why we never heard of Constitution on Chest Guy, Little White Boy with Terrorist's Name & Friends, Veteran with Too Much Implanted Metal or TSA Pen. Tester Guy. The media just isn't interested in the plight of the white man.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Obviously you don't live near or have experienced "roadside safety checks" where the local gestapo indiscriminately pulls over every vehicle in a fishing-expedition for anything from forgotten safety-belts (seat belts) to that roach that's been under your seat for 15 years, or perhaps some actual rare real violation such as drunk driving, etc.
They pull vehicles over with no probable cause and subject them to searches if they twitch or sweat or the carefully trained "police dog" sits on command to please it's trainer and thus will hit on everyone, every time so they will always have cause to search you. Or they might ask you a few questions to see if you appear nervous. Well, of fucking course you're nervous, you are in severe danger of having your life fucked with, completely upset and turned upside down with a mere crook of their finger.
Also, lately they have been talking about expanding the role of TSA to harass people at sporting events, and at train and bus terminals, so the erosion of our freedom/society is not only continuing, it's expanding, or trying to.
This, all the suburban traffic cops are all dressing like SWAT-team members for either the intimidation factor, or that they think it looks "cool" and there was oodles of extra Homeland Security grant money to pay for all that neat stuff.
[Godwin Alert] This is just shy of the good old Nazi checkpoints - "Papers, Please" and actual jackboots would be the only things missing. So, yeah - even travel within supposedly safe areas of this "free" country is getting fucked up and are becoming hazardous to your rights and so-called freedom. What little you (we) have left, anyway.
-- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
Other things that will set off the detector/test if you handle your lugage at any time while contaminated with them include:
The list goes on, but the point is, even transporting your lugage in the same trunk as you carried potting soil in 2 months ago is going to get you flagged as a positive. After that, it's going down hill for you.
None of those are examples in which the federal government heavily resisted state autonomy to make such a decision, with the exception of the Fugitive Slave Act. Thus, none of them are things done in the name of state's rights.
These are the ones that pop into my head, but I'm sure I could list of similar examples all day long. State law has been at the forefront of just about every major civil rights issue in our nation's history.
They've also been at the far other side. Many of the Southern states refused to ratify the 19th Amendment and led the charge against women's suffrage; several never even signed it until the late 20th century. Many states (also again in the South) have amended their own constitution to deny gays the right to marry.
Do we even need to talk about slavery and race relations? Except maybe to acknowledge the nadir of American race relations post-Reconstruction? How about California's "Foreign Miner's Tax" of 1850 or the "Anti-Coolie Law" of 1862 to go after the Chinese? (19th century California's hate-on for the Chinese is frequently forgotten.) Or how about their "Greaser Act" against Mexicans from 1855?
You also have wonders like Texas leading the way in 1883 on the convict-lease system to use prisoners as slave labor. You know, the chain-gangs of old.
I'm from the South. I don't trust my state legislature not to attempt to put the screws to anyone that's likely to vote against them. Just look at the wave of laws North Carolina passed as soon as section 5 of the Voting Rights Act got knocked out.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").