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Brooklyn Assemblyman Dov Hikind made some controversial remarks over the weekend, saying the subway bag checks were ineffective and that the NYPD should use racial profiling to look for suspected terrorists. Now, Gothamist agrees with the former point, but terrorists can come in all shapes and sizes - the people of Oklahoma City would probably like to remind him of that. Sure, no one wants to have to search the "75-year-old grandmother, with sloping shoulders, who has an oversized tote bag firmly tucked under her arm," but the truth is, she'd be happy to show the NYPD what's in her tote bag. John Jay College Professor Charles Strozier (he specializes in contemporary terrorism) told NY1, "The Arab-American community in the United States and Muslim community in general is highly assimilated, very American, not radical. There's no reason to believe that it is from this community that you're going to find anyone who is likely to be a bomber."
The bag checks, so far, have been seemingly inconsequential, but hey, New Yorkers love to have something to sound off about.
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dov hikind seems like a bit of a nutter. if you follow the link above, it discusses his idea to have metro card vending machines in yiddish. does anybody speak yiddish anymore? my grandparents did, but i can't think of anybody under the age of 80 (who doesn't also speak english) who does.
Yeah, I'm sooooo sure Dov wouldn't object either if somehow his people were targeted....oh, but then it would be called anti-semitism. These double standards always work when it's not your own who are pinpointed. Give me a break. We already know that nobody can pick the right people anyway, what with hate crimes on innocent Sikhs simply because of their turbans and a Brazilian shot down in the tube...anyone remember witnesses refered to him as "asian looking". GIVE ME A BREAK.
Imagine the following scenario: 1000 people carrying big bags are walking into a subway train. One of them has a bomb. The bomber has a 95% chance of fitting a specific profile and only 5% of the people entering the subway fit that profile. Do you randomly search everyone, or do you target your search on the 5%? Obviously you are *FAR* more likely to intercept the bomber by a targeted search. The questions isn't whether or not it's effective, of course it is. The question is at what price. Do we allow an innocent minority of our population to be subject to additional security measures just because they happen to fit the bomber profile? In my mind that's a tough question. I think it's a balancing act between the actual likelyhood of an attack and the real pain-in-the-ass factor that minority will have to bear for the rest of us. After all America should foster a welcoming environment to people from all over the world. On the other hand when we have specific information that a attack is pending from a group fitting a specifc profile, I think it's reasonable to subject people of that profile to some additional security checks.
This guy is a complete idiot and needs to be fired for suggesting such a thing. We are already on a slippery slope and he just took the hysteria one step closer to the creation of a fascist state in America. Next thing they'll be moving on from people who look Middle Eastern to people who wear odd hats becaus hey look too much like a turban and anyone with a turban must be threatening. What's next? Saying gay people should be profiled as terrorists because evangelists say they threaten the American Way just in different manner. This is 2005, not 1939. We are smarter than this now.
Didn't the 9/11 terrorists look really clean-cut and slicked up? They watched popular TV and made small talk about movies, they wore designer clothes and smelled of nice cologne. They aren't stupid--they went through extensive training to blend in.
If the police start profiling, all terrorists have to do is bypass the profile. (Which is what they did before). An extreme example--they can simply recruit some old granny terrorists who apparently will never be checked.
And folks, think about this....statistically, most suicide bombers have been male and thus some insane extremist groups started using women....these crazy people will always be one step ahead, so if we start profiling only a certain group, uh, hello, they'll start getting the unsuspected people to do the dirty work. Profiling gets us nowhere. GIVE ME A BREAK.
No Mario, imagine this: Two million people are carrying large bags, including 20 thousand "Arab looking young men" and 400,000 "white-looking people of all ages and sexes" One Arab is carrying a bomb and one white-looking person is carrying a bomb. That is the reality of the threats we face. The numbers of people involved are huge and the threats are needles in those haystacks. So even if the chance of a bomber being an Arab or whatever is several times higher than a white person being a bomber, the odds of any individual being a bomber are miniscule. So both random checks and racial checks are lame.
Now do you base your security on race and random checks or do you base it on actually going out to find actual clues and evidence to help catch the bombers in advance? And just as importantly, do you want bombers, even Arab bombers, to know that if they can get a white lady to carry the bomb the plan will work? Racial profiling in the US is stupid security in addition to being immoral.
Think about it. Read some real thinking on security -- I recomend the book _Beyond_Fear_ for starters.
There are electronic security gates at airports and even in some schools...if you want to be thorough (and inevitably piss people off, but that's gonna happen), then why not have electronic security gates that people have to go through before getting to the subway turnstile entrance. Yes, it's a pain, but it's a heck of a lot more thorough than this other selective and biased searching.
Well, did Dov see today's news - BBC states http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4737659.stm This is the problem with his idea. Not only is it racist, it won't work. All it will do is piss off a new generation of Arabs and Asians and ofcourse he will get votes from "his people". Might I remind Dov some of the suspects in the "failed bombing" in London were not Arabs or atleast did not look Arabs. I know Dov could care less, but ask any African-America how he/she feels getting pulled over while driving just because of his/her looks.
Most of the people who leave their country to come to the US loves being here. This is the place where anyone can "make it".
hmmm, what are the gates for? To catch bombs? They're not so good at that and it would take a very trained eye to do so. To stop people from carrying knives? I wasn't aware it was illegal to carry a knife. To catch what? And even with a trained eye, it's hard to spot something when you see thousands and thousands of innocuous items. The eyes and brain fatigue. Running electronic security requires serious manpower to do correctly. There are constantly stories of things slipping by security personnel at airports for these reasons.
And besides, is it now the case that the subway is some sort of space where people don't have Fourth Amendment rights to search without cause? That's not right. I don't agree to being searched in public unless the police have some specific cause to search me.
Terrorist attacks against American interests are more often than not, commited by Muslim males. Sorry. Everyone loves to cite the Oklahoma City bombing, but as we all know from Statistics 101, that's what we call an outlier. (Not to mention the many accounts of the Muslim men McVeigh was hanging with in the days before the bombing). Let's review. HISTORY TEST BITCH! The events are actual cuts from past history. They actually happened!!! Do you remember in 1968 Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by a Muslim male extremist between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by a Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40.
During the 1980's a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1985 the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70 year old American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his
wheelchair by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1985 TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens, and a US Navy diver trying to rescue passengers was murdered by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1993 the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles to take out the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one crashed into the Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers. Thousands of people were killed by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 2002 the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. In 2002 reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and murdered by Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40. Nope, I really don't see a pattern here to justify profiling, do you? So, to ensure we Americans never offend anyone, particularly fanatics intent on killing us, airport security screeners will no longer be allowed to profile certain people. They must conduct random searches, but only seach at random Muslim Males between the ages 17 and 40 alone because of profiling.
Lebron, I know you are just trolling, but I've got to respond to your nonsense. The reasons to not use racial profiling are not about not "offending" someone -- it's about right and wrong. Plus it's about efficacy. Ready my post about numbers to get a sense of reality. There is nothing wrong with going after specific muslim men, or a black person like me, or whoever, with cause. Without cause it's anti-American. You don't seem to get that, do you.
This depresses me. I feel like the only country I know, the United States, is slowly rejecting me. I wonder if Mayor Bloomberg will comment.
Paki, It depresses me too. After the London bombings I thought the whole problem was intractable. When we look at the patterns and the way Islam extremists look, it is true that they fit a profile. But I agree with jt that it doesn't matter because random bag searches are not effective. And so, the one poster, Mario, who says that members of certain minority groups will be paying the price for everyone's safety is also wrong. We are no safer.
The real response is through diplomacy -- separating extremists from the Muslim mainstream and allying with the Muslim mainstream. Racial profiling, wars in the middle east, and Ambassador Bolton aren't going to do it for us. If only we had smarter leaders. Also, I'd like to say that as New Yorkers, we are too diverse and too smart for racial profiling.
We should be too smart for this, yet Mr. Hikind is a Councilman and has a constiutency that supports him.
JT,
I agree with you 100%. But absolutely NONE of your statements and facts about the percentages involved in catching a bomber address the fact that these bombings are almost exclusively done by young, Muslim men. Can we please explain that? How about this, if everyone who fit this profile was searched, their would either a) be some bombs intercepted, or b) the terrorists would find people who don't fit the profile to bring the bombs in. Hmm.
ok lebron, now let's review the real truth. you seem to be looking for stats to support his racism. you choose to pass off not only the OKcity bombings but also the atlanta olympics bombing, the weathermen bombings, the SLA kidnappings and murders, kkk lynchings, the italian red brigade kidnappings and murders, and the list goes on. almost all white christian men. how many do you need before you no longer consider them 'outliers'? i don't believe your claim that there is an identifiable profile for terrorist tactics except one: young men.
and since you throw in american invasions as part of your tally, you're also glossing over the 'morally upright' terrorism perpetrated by the US and israel against muslim civilians. is there any question why we're targeted? keep targeting an economically and politically repressed group with nothing to lose and you can probably guess that they will not take it sitting down. do you really believe that bag searches and racial profiling will have a positive effect? i think a clear-headed diplomatic solution that actually looks at the root causes of hatred (yours and the islamicists) is indeed the only way.
Hi hijiki! Thanks for your comments. Regarding the 'morally upright' terrorism, let's just keep on the subject here and not lose our focus. (Even though i agree with you on that one 100%, ok?).
What makes all the terrorist attacks I listed different than the ones you listed, is that all minie are done under the guise of Islamo-fascism. Jihad. Whatever you want to call it. It's a cause. There is no one combining thread that binds together your examples of terrorism by white people. If there is, please enlighten us with the real truth. You are grouping all those together based on their RACE/ETHNICITY, (white/anglo) not their CAUSE/BELIEFS (racism, revolution, etc etc). Sounds like you're the racist to me. Also, how is stating simple facts like I did racist? You're a fucking fascist methinks.
Oh and I have two more to add ot my list. No wait, three more. The millenium bomber, the 1993 WTC bombers, and the thwarted bombers of the Atlantic Avenue subway station in Brooklyn. All of them young, male, Muslims. All Jihadists.
Point being, terrorists can and do come in all colors. Yes, they are male and young. However, there seems to be an over abundance of terrorists and suicide bombers from this one subset. They're a bit overrepresented, no?
Lebron -- you're not making any sense. There are terrorist acts by non-muslims and people who are not young men. The simple facts are that even if everyone who fit that "profile were searched"
A: it would not eliminate terrorism because there would still be terrrorism by other people
B: it would not eliminate terrorism because even the young muslim terrorists could find people who didn't look like them to help them
C: it would increase the hatred of the US by muslims, actually getting more people to support or at least not expose terrorists due to sympathy for them
D: it would be a huge misdirection of resources from actually identifyting terrorists based on their actions
E: it's morally wrong to subject innocent people to search for no reason other than their ethnic appearance and age.
But you know, other than those small details, you're right on target. Keep up the good work!
to make your list, you're artificially segregating one group to make your point. it's not true that all of the happenings you listed occured under a common thread (the 'jihad' banner). that's a convenient way to lump terrorism into one basket so it's easier to blame someone. i think it is a racist tactic to seek out unfortunate events, twist the real motives to fit your agenda, ignore the ones that don't fit, and then curtail the rights of a group based on their race or religion. i'm the 'fascist'?
here's an example: the munich olympics hostage ordeal was about palestinians fighting for what they thought was their homeland, not a jihad against the west. they abducted israelis to draw global attention to their cause because they are too poor, unorganized and have no military to defend themselves. what does that really have to do with the people who fought in afghanistan? or who bombed WTC?
most of your list is made up of groups with different agendas. with the help of a marketing campaign like 'the war on terror' you could also lump nearly all of the groups i listed into political extremists or hate groups easy enough.
for example, there's a list of right-wing christian terrorists of which the OKcity bomber, the atlanta olympics/abortion clinic bomber, the kkk and neo-nazis and others fit to the same standards of commonality you used to make your list. i wouldn't be so confident in your idea of a common thread. not enough to deny consitutional rights to a 'subset'.
JT, not sure how I'm not making sense. I agree with you that there are terrorist acts by non-Muslims. You're not blowing any minds with that one. Sorry. In response:
A) True.
B) Debatable, not proven they could find anyone else to commit their acts of violence. (and please don't bring up John Walker Lindh)
C) True, but that's an awful big assumption innit?
D) Not sure how to identify terrorists by their actions, when they are not a terrorist until they commit an act of terrorism which we want to prevent in the first place. I'm all for allocating resources to the proper places, but where are the places that will prevent terrorist acts?
E) Morally is not legally. That's really just your own views, not facts, thus, irrelevant. Even though I agree with your morality but morality shouldn't come into play with laws, that's President Bush territory.
Hijikiki, #1, I have no agenda. I am absolutely for profiling, same as when the FBI does it for criminals etc, for all groups, KKK assholes, Nazi fucks, abortion city bombers etc. They are all a certain type.
As for Munich, are you that blind to think the tragic events there are not at all related to the events of today? Of course they are. Please don't denigrate the Muslim and Arab quest for an independent Palestine. You're splitting them into a bunch of unrelated vignettes, instead of the grand story of a people fighting for their rights. Please be more respectful. It's all related, they are not separate events. Come on.
If we look at terrorism as a whole (crackers included) we find that terrorism committed on US interests by the subset I mentioned does more damage and kills more people (unless you consider Sept 11th an outlier) than other groups terorism. Maybe we should rename the 'War on Terrorism' the "War on Muslim Terrorists (not Mulsims)"
Hijiki, you say i't snot enough to deny constitutional rights to a subset. What is then? Anything? I personally think not, but then again we also need to be practical.
I guess that's all for now.
Lebron:
"IT" had a good point when he said that profiling "would not eliminate terrorism because even the young muslim terrorists could find people who didn't look like them to help them".
You replied by saying it's debatable. The four men who were arrested for the failed bombing in London were African. The one caught in Rome could pass for African-American, African-Latin, or African-African.
To further complicate matters, I would like to point out that Muslims are not a race and not necessarily Arab.
Lastly, Hikind himself looks Arab if it wasn't for his yamaka. I wonder if that means if a terrorist simply dons a yamaka then he's clear to do the terrible things he wants to do
Paki,
In regards to the men arrested in London and in Rome. Are you sure they committed the crime? I'm not sure about the UK, but here in America people are considered innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. How can you prove they are guilty or were perhaps the victims of a racially charged dragnet? You can't.
Here's my solution: America out of the middle east. Jews, Palestinians, please enjoy and play nicely in your sandbox. Bye bye kiddies!
I just said they were arrested, I didn't say they were guilty.
I think the larger issues are the one you just alluded to, what are we doing in the Middle East? What are we doing over there that IS worth the sacrifice of our liberties and way of life? What are we doing there that IS NOT worth the sacrifices of our liberties and way of life?
I believe that the problems we are dealing with now require more than simple law enforcement strategies (bag checks, showing your ID at the airport, etc.). There definitely is a (decreasing) marginal benefit to these responses.
Hijiki,
Ususally I agree with many of your points but you are waaaay off-base with the Olympic massacre in Munich. To begin with the Israeli athletes were not "abducted" they were murdered at point-blank range. Get your facts straight. Furthermore they were unarmed and caught off-guard, so it was a cowardly, TERRORIST act. While I am a virulent opponent of the current right-wing policies of the current Israeli Administration you cannot seriously expect anyone to believe that an army attacking armed militants is the same as murderers sneaking up on unarmed competitors in a locker room. And you have absolutely no proof that the murderers were poor... many terrorists (of EVERY ethnic group) come from educated, well-to-do families and are brainwashed into doing what they do.
So cut the bullsh*t. You're implying what they did was justifiable under the circumstances. By your reasoning, then, so were the bombings in the UK, Spain, and September 11.
Paki,
With your comment about the men arrested not being of Arab descent, you imply their guilt by using them as an example of Muslim terrorists recruiting non-Muslims for their cause and crimes, in response to my 'debatable' comment. Don't try to weasel your way out of that one, ding dong.
I'm sorry if I implied that it was a fact the men recently caught in Europe were guilty. However, my point is just the same: you cannot tell who is a terrorist based on how they look.
Moreover, if you are so concerned about fundamental legal principles, why have you not mentioned the Fourth Amendment?
I'm sorry if I offended your commitment to fundamental legal principles. I did not mean to pass off as fact that the men caught in Europe were found guilty. However, the point of my mentioning them is that you cannot tell who is a terrorist based on how they look.
Moreover, your concern for the law and civil rights seems to not include the Fourth Amendment. Smthg I find curious.
I'm not saying race, appearance, etc. is NOT a factor at all. But the law leaves us many tools to address the security issue. If there is a probable cause to search somebody, then the police can search that person. But once we say that race is probable cause enough, then we are clearly violating civil rights. That's how I feel as smbdy that would be subject to these measures.
As for the 4th Amendment, the searches have not been shown to be 'unreasonable'. They very well may be found to, in a court of law. Granted, there are no warrants, but there aren't any warrants in airports either.
You're smart, please explain.
Actually, in regard to your double negative statement, I disagree. RACE IS NOT A FACTOR. Just because someone is born a certain ethnicity does not determine their actions. There is a higher probablilty they will have certain characteristics or behaviours, but it's not genetic. Terrorism is not genetic ok? It's just statistics, nothing to get upset about. I hate numbers too sometimes.