and there is also just plain racial profiling...
Some real Shock and Awe: Racially profiled and cuffed in Detroit
Shoshana Hebshi had the misfortune of looking a bit too middle-eastern on a plane on September 11, 2011. Half Jewish, half Arab, and fully American, she was taken off the plane, cuffed, strip searched and basically given a whole lot of harassment not due to any of her behaviours, but rather how she looked. That shouldn't be the legacy of 9/11. I know the authorities need to be careful and run down leads, but this seems way overkill. Read her blog post for more.
I know someone who is a fairly dark-skinned woman who is constantly pulled out of line and asked to strip down to her bra. Her husband, also Jewish but lighter in skin, sails through without a raised eyebrow.
Terrorists can't be profiled by how they look. Look at Timothy McVeigh, for example. Not all threats to homeland security come from abroad.
I'm supposed to fly to Chicago in December, the first time I'll be on a plane since 1993. I've never had to deal with pat downs and TSA/Homeland Security regulations and the like. Fortunately I am light-skinned, WASPish in appearance, and basically look innocuous. So I don't anticipate problems. But in a post-9/11 world, you can't make assumptions. Shoshana Hebshi and her family had joked about flying while ethnic, but never seriously expected trouble like what she got yesterday.
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