Back in July, Manish posted about the killing of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes that took place in the London Tube. He was a young, brown-skinned man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and was shot in the head by police as a result of a series of unfortunate events. Manish titled his post Rashomon on the Tube. “Rashomon” was a reference to an Akira Kurosawa film in which people that witnessed the same incident had all reported seeing different things. When I read that air marshals had shot and killed Rigoberto Alpizar at the Miami airport yesterday, the first thing I thought of was de Menezes. Early reports said that the man was frantic, trying to run, mentioned a bomb, and reached into his bag just prior to being shot. I tried to put myself in the position of the air marshals. It would have been a tough choice, but I would have probably fired as well. When reports later surfaced that the man’s wife was yelling that he was “bi-polar” and “off his meds” I had to pause. The air marshals should have considered this, but its still a judgement call in my opinion. The latest news however makes me think that this is “Rashomon” all over again. Time Magazine reports:
At least one passenger aboard American Airlines Flight 924 maintains the federal air marshals were a little too quick on the draw when they shot and killed Rigoberto Alpizar as he frantically attempted to run off the airplane shortly before take-off.
“I don’t think they needed to use deadly force with the guy,” says John McAlhany, a 44-year-old construction worker from Sebastian, Fla. “He was getting off the plane.” McAlhany also maintains that Alpizar never mentioned having a bomb.
“I never heard the word ‘bomb’ on the plane,” McAlhany told TIME in a telephone interview. “I never heard the word bomb until the FBI asked me did you hear the word bomb. That is ridiculous.” Even the authorities didn’t come out and say bomb, McAlhany says. “They asked, ‘Did you hear anything about the b-word?'” he says. “That’s what they called it.”
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p>Look at the striking similarities in these cases (besides their pictures):
- Both men were killed in the name of protecting citizens from terrorism and turned out to be innocent.
- Both men ran from, and were fired upon by plain clothes law enforcement officers.
- Both men were of South American ancestry.
- In both cases witnesses describe facts which contradict the first reports from the authorities.
The marshals say Alpizar announced he was carrying a bomb before being killed.
However, no other witness has publicly concurred with that account. Only one passenger recalled Alpizar saying, “I’ve got to get off, I’ve got to get off,” CNN’s Kathleen Koch reported. [Link]
This whole incident is a bit unnerving to me because the new norm in law enforcement, as announced last week by the Miami Police Department, may be to have more “in your face” tactics so as to go on the offensive against terrorists. Bolder tactics might also result in greater mistakes, which in turn are likeliest to affect people from an Arab or South Asian background.
Police are planning “in-your-face” shows of force in public places, saying the random, high-profile security operations will keep terrorists guessing about where officers might be next.As an example, uniformed and plainclothes officers might surround a bank building unannounced, contact the manager about ways to be vigilant against terrorists and hand out leaflets in three languages to customers and people passing by, said police spokesman Angel Calzadilla. He said there would be no random checks of identification.
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p>“People are definitely going to notice it,” Deputy Police Chief Frank Fernandez said Monday. “We want that shock. We want that awe. But at the same time, we don’t want people to feel their rights are being threatened. We need them to be our eyes and ears.”
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p>The other thing this incident brought to mind was the movie Jarhead, which I saw recently [spoiler alert: skip to the next paragraph if you haven’t seen the movie]. Towards the end of the movie the two main characters have become incredibly frustrated because, despite all their training, they have not gotten to shoot a single bullet while at war. In the final scene one of them almost goes crazy when denied the opportunity to a kill a man within his crosshairs. If it were me and my job was to ride on airplanes all day for the last few years, without ever having to draw my gun, I can imagine that if an incident ever did occur on my watch I would be hyper-ready to act. This isn’t the same as being trigger-happy, but it could lead to the same outcome.
“The federal air marshals have been trained to deal with terrorists and how to fire their weapons, obviously effectively, given what happened [Wednesday],” says Andrew Thomas, an aviation security expert at the University of Akron in Ohio. “But the question needs to be asked: Has that training been upgraded to deal with this rise again in air rage and the introduction of these new items on Dec. 22? If somebody shows up with a knife and is going to stab a flight attendant or start stabbing themselves, do we shoot them?”
Among flight crews who are regularly in contact with air marshals, some say there’s been confusion and mission creep since the FAM service was ramped up. Initially, marshals were clear that their mandate was to protect the cockpit, and they told flight crews they wouldn’t respond to problems at the back of the plane, unless they were life-threatening. That was in part to keep their cover from being blown. Indeed, marshals are trained to distinguish between a possible terrorist ruse to draw them out and the bad behavior of a drunken or disturbed passenger. [Link]
(thanks to Manish for helping me with some links on this post)
Great job, Abhi. Here’s some more interesting data. Plainclothes cops can lead to confusion:
Nonlethal alternatives are needed, as with the London guy (and, in fact, some London cops have switched over):
We really, really need explosives scanning for all luggage– carry-ons and checked-in luggage– not just X-rays:
Alpizar was a Home Depot paint salesman and was returning from a Christian missionary trip:
Marshals use low velocity hollowpoints:
Related posts on the London shooting: one, two, three, four, five
I had the same thought about the similarity of the cases, but you beat me to writing about it. There were certainly problems with eyewitness testimony in the de Menezes case and in others, as well as perception problems that arise in stressful situations.
Perhaps we should look into making common cause with our Hispanic brothers and sisters. . .so sad. ..his poor wife. A stun gun would have done the job. . .
Excellent post Abhi. This is a tough one. I’m sure everyone can see both sides of the issue here. I wonder if the nationwide alert put out by the FBI put the Air Marshals slightly more on edge and made them more trigger happy than usual.
If the guy had a bomb, or some trigger mechanism, would a stun gun discharging high voltage be a good idea?
Just a thought.
There is no perfect solution when the primary element making decisions is human. Personally, I will pass judgment once the story becomes more consitent. Many different versions are running around, too much speculation.
There are a lot of questions about this case, like how could he have gotten a bomb on the plane after he went through security multiple times. Talking about bombs has always been a bad idea in airports, but are they going to start shooting people now? Also, is it a coincidence that the london victim and this guy were both middle-eastern looking. Would the marshals have shot a White guy? But I have to agree with GujuDude on this one. The specifics of the case arent clear yet, so will have to withhold judgement. After 9/11, there was talk of complete chaos in the aviation industry in the event of a second attack in the US. I wonder how this will impact the aviation industry. If I have to choose between driving and a cap in my ass, I dont think the choice will be that hard to make.
So far non-lethal methods have unfortunately never had the absolute stopping power of a well placed bullet. In an enclosed environment like a plane there is also the problem of making such non-lethal technology small enough to carry concealed by an air marshall. In addition, some individuals have an extraordinarily high threshold for pain and such devices may not sufficiently slow them and restrict them from carrying out their intentions.
For the foreseeable future there doesn’t seem to be an alternative to projectile based weapons. Though I’m surprised that hollow points and not frangible bullets are used.
This is a terribly sad incident and it’s difficult to put ourselves in the Marshalls place giving the circumstances.
But I hate to play devils advocate. Both guys pretty much look white to me, not brown in any way. Frankly some of the terrorists from 9/11 (unfortunately this is where the stereotype began) look black and some look Indian.
Arab men from Saudi/Afghan actually can have light hair/eyes/skin and look more Mediterranian. I don’t find either of these men look brown or could be mistaken for being brown. Am I alone?
I don’t think that this is the crux of the problem. These men weren’t shot because they had brown skin. But…the circumstances that led to their deaths seems very likely to reoccur in my opinion, and that makes me, as a South Asian male, even more paranoid about the ways in which our government is reacting to the threat of terrorism.
Unfortunately this statement is misleading. Say, for example, that bomb screening equipment was employed across the US — does it then follow that there cannot be any bombs on planes, or in airports ever?
It’s true that slipping a bomb onto a plane might be harder, but if one assumes that this helps the FAM decide against firing, then the same decision process will fail when a bomb actually slips through.
Getting the mix right in practice is rather difficult. Our courts, for example, choose to not convict anyone innocent, at the expense of occasionally failing to convict the guilty (a process that goes wrong not too infrequently.)
So far terrorism have killed 2800 people in US since 9/11
Since terrorism gets such a huge press, day in and day out, those whose job it is to prevent terrorism are more edgy.
MJ, in earlier comment points out the “Shoe Bomber” advisory put out by FBI. I agree with MJ that it might have contributed to the edgy-ness of Marshals. But then we know how the Air Marshals mis-behaved with Dr. Bob Rajcoomar
Also, is it a coincidence that the london victim and this guy were both middle-eastern looking.
i agree with jane.
menzes looked like a cookie-cutter white brazilian (mostly southwest european ancestry). he looked a lot more like the ‘white’ barrista at sbux than the typical brown person. the most prevelant picture that abhi linked to even hints at pink cheeks. there is a common white racialist ‘test’ where if you get slapped and that results in reddish cheeks you are ‘white.’
i detect a tendency toward conditional perceptions here. it is common, in my experience, for middle easterners who objectively look white to simply be labeled ‘brown.’ that irritates me, because in regards to the genetics and phenetics (genes and looks) the vast majority of ‘middle easterners’ are not close to south asians, and in fact are far closer to southern europeans, and to some extent, even northern europeans. even the darker skinned brown ones tend to have lots african ancestry, which gives them curly hair and features that are orthogonal to south asianness. i have a close friend who is half-scottish american and half-arab who ‘looks white’ and is treated and perceived as white until he tells someone his name (which is arab), and which point he morphs into ‘brown.’ i recall surveys of college students indicate that perceptions of whiteness are closely linked to perceptions of the nation of origin as much as physical reality. for example, american college students often assume that argentines are not white, even though a higher % of argentina’s population is of european ancestry than the united states (40% of argentines are of italian ancestry and have arrived within the past century). as regards to ‘south american ancestry,’ such a contention is also difficult to parse because south americans are overall triracial mixes. some nations are mixed (mexico). some nations are mostly amerindian (bolivia). some nations are mostly white (argentina). in the united states the ‘hispanic’ (or latino, it is PC depending on region of the nation from what i can tell) category is a catchall which connotes non-whiteness, even though objectively many latinos can ‘pass’ as white. is cameron diaz (half white cuban, and in latin nations perceptions of race are real and salient) non-white? i recall a story from a few years ago where they were describing the rise of non-white celebrities…like christina aguilera (half-ecuadorian).
my point in this somewhat priggish and pedantic comment (i admit it) is that #1 commonality between menzies and the recently deceased gentlemen is not ‘brownness,’ but rather their somewhat erratic behavior (one due to illegal status, another due to mental illness). yes, brown people are profiled, and this gentlemen looks amerindian, so perhaps they did think he was brown. his brown appearence likely increased his chances of being shot, but his behavior was the necessary condition (if not sufficient). but in the case of menzies, i recall people described him as ‘middle eastern’ looking post facto, but in hindsight it looks to me that people said what they were expected to say, someone who acted like a terrorist by definition looks middle eastern. in any case, i think one thing about american society is that perceptions of racial identity are fungible, subjective and circumstantial. for the sake of precision and accuracy i am against this as much as it is practically possible to avoid it. white looking hispanics and middle eastern people should not be labeled brown if that isn’t the physical reality. white people do this usually to distance themselves from the Other by simply placing them in an alien category, where they do not belong (i once had a swarthy italian guy tell me i looked like sadam hussein, when frankly, he looked a lot more like a ‘wog’ than i did). in the short term lumping menzies (white) together with this somewhat amerindian looking gentlemen might allow us to see a trend, which probably exists anyhow (fear of a brown man), but i think it is best to keep fidelity to the facts as much as possible.
Although not “brown,” they both have dark hair and eyes, and could probably pass for middle eastern. Maybe their English was accented, and they gave off a “foreigner” vibe to the air marshals.
These cues tap into terrorist stereotypes or “profiles,” too, and could have contributed to the decision the marshals made.
This is a problem with profiling (assuming that is what happened). It’s hardly precise.
razib do you have any sources on argentianian immigration you can point to for someone to read?
Migration from Southern Italy to Argentina: Calabrians and Sicilians (1880-1930). also check cia factbook. the white %, 97, is too high because people report that they are white even if they are mixed-race, as many of the spanish origin argentines have past histories of racial admixture. but, the USA is 70% non-white, and my estimate for the european quanta of ancestry overall in the argentine population would be around 80-90%, the italian part wouldn’t have colonial admixture, and the ‘pure spanish’ are mostly spanish, with a large amerindian minority. the large welsh, german, jewish and arab minorities in argentina are likely have little amerindian ancestry.
70% non-white
correction, non-hispanic white (though this includes middle easterners). i believe about half of hispanics put ‘white’ as their race.
p.s. important point about argentina, it is an nice nation to test hypotheses of whiteness because it is often a social, political and economic basket-case. ergo, non-white 🙂 only it isn’t….
There’s a stomach churning moment near the end of Mondovino when a prominent upperclass Argentine winemaking family calmly spews racist bile about the native wine producers being lazy and stupid, clearly feeling that the white, French producer won’t care. He takes his revenge by then giving the most sympathetic and human treatment to exactly one such native wine producer, someone who is clearly hardworking, intelligent and kind. It’s astonishingly direct racism, especially in contrast to previous frames and frames of upperclass Italian and French families lithely dancing around the extent to which they cooperated with the Fascists and the Nazis respectively, and the wealthy California white winemaking families going to great pains to show how sensitive to and friendly with they were with the Mexican laborers who did all the actual work at their wineries. Besides the Argentine native there was only two families–the nice old guy and his kids in France, and the Brazilian newbies–who seemed to get their hands completely dirty right along with the laborers to make the wine they were so proud of.
A total tangent. Racial perceptions have a lot to do with class. . . who thinks of Steve Jobs or even Ralph Nader as Arab?
Ralph Nader and Casey Casem I knew – but Steve Jobs? Interesting …
also, tiffany. aka, tiffany darwish.
Razib, you’re dating yourself. They don’t remember Tiffany.
As somebody who does, I was surprised to see that she’s not just Arab American, she’s first or second gen:
ok, well, shannon elizabeth.
or salma hayek.
Or my favorite, Shakira!
There is also always good ol’ Paula Abdul.
There is also always good ol’ Paula Abdul.
yes, but note that her father was a sephardic jew from syria (her mother is an ashkenazi jew). which of course makes sense that she ‘looks arab,’ a friend of mine jokes that her uncle (she is ashkenazi jewish) looks like osama bin laden.
She can’t be Arab b/c she’s half Ashkenazi, or b/c she’s all Jew? I’m confused. I thought Sephardic Jews were Arab Jews.
I thought Sephardic Jews were Arab Jews.
there is a big debate about this within the ‘sephardic’ jewry. a few points
1) sephard refers to spain. the “arab” character of the sephardic jewry is because some of the exiles settled in morocco (lesser extent syria). sephardic jews who settled in say, italy, greece or turkey, were obviously never ‘arab’ jews since they never spoke arabic (the traditional sephardic language is ladino, a hebrew & arabic inflected romance language).
2) many of the groups termed ‘sephardic’ are not sephardic, they are in fact ‘mizrachi,’ which refers to ‘eastern’ jews (yemeni, iraqi, bukharan, etc.).
3) but in any case, a) the jews of iraq, syria and yemen did speak arabic as their first language, but, 1) they were not often considered arab by arabs (christian or muslim) 2) they did not consider themselves arab.
4) in the 1950s the jews of the arab world were expelled and resettled to israel (morocco was the exception, though most moroccon jews left of their own will). their attitude toward arab countries is very mixed, and they tend to support the right-wing likud party traditionally more than labor. just as many german and polish jews had little attachment to german and polish nationality, when in israel jews from iraq, morocco or syria did not define themselves arabs of jewish identity, rather, they were jews who lived in arab lands.
5) there is a counter-movement among some young intellectuals to reclaim an arab identity (which many people would argue never existed since jews were excluded from arab society, and arab nationalism is a tepid affair as it is, overwhelmed by clan or pan-islamic identities).
6) nevertheless, i have noticed that in north america jews from the arab countries by origin are often labeled by their national origin. i.e., i assumed that the canadian actress Emmanuelle Chriqui was arab as it was often noted that her parents were ‘moroccan.’ but later i found out that she is sephardic jewish.
Thank you for the lesson; I leave SM more enlightened 🙂 I just drew my info from the Arab American Institute who maybe has it twisted? Or maybe not. I give up — I’ll stick to Shakira, who is comparatively a better dancer and way hotter than Paula.
and while i can’t shut up, i will add something else. a few years ago at harvard there was a campaign by anti-zionist activists to label the jewish state racist, and jews were popped into a ‘white imperialists who were oppressing brown people’ paradigm. natalie portman, born in israel, wrote a letter to the harvard crimson pointing out that jews from arab lands are usually just as “brown” as arabs, and they formed almost half of israeli jews (the influx of russian jews has reduced them from a majority of the jewish population of israel to the slight minority in the past 15 years). if you see a black person in israel, it is likely a jew, and ethiopian jew that is. have you ever wondered why suicide bombers can walk into public places in israel without being noticed? because so many look like “jews.”
the point is that the reason it is so easy to say that ‘race is socially constructed’ is that people do construct race to suit their own agendas. i.e., white people are imperialists and oppress browns, jews are imperialists who oppress palestinians, ergo, jews are white and palestinians are brown. of course the reality is that it is much more complicated than that. we obviously aren’t going to get rid of the social constructionist issues because races are fuzzy…but, getting back to the point why i piped up, as a brown person, i object whenever someone says something which implies that arabs are brown. the reality is that i’ve noticed that american whites will usually concede that you when list people like doug flutie, shannon elizabeth, geoff george, tiffany, steve jobs, kasey casem, etc. that they are arab and obviously can pass as white. they will usually concede that their perception that arab terrorists are ‘brown’ is mislabeling to some extent. if they are stubborn i’ll offer to compare my brown ass with their white one, and then go find some shannon elizabeth nudes to see which skin tone she matches more. this won’t get rid of the problems relating to profiling, but it comes closer to making ‘white’ people acknowledge the baseless roots of their behavior when they go around targeting sikhs and other assorted browns when the reality is that most terrorists look whiter than brown!
comparatively a better dancer and way hotter than Paula.
do you think so? i agree, shakira mebarak shakes some good ass, but remember that paula was a laker girl….
Now that I’ve drawn things way far from plainsclothes police, I just wanted to comment on Arabs being categorized as “brown.” I think this is a tricky question, particularly because it plays into the politics of “passing” and into some kind of colorism scale of how brown you have to be before you fit into an American racial paradigm. Maybe this is just my context, but my experience with other brown communities embracing Arabs/Arab-Americans as compatriots in the suffering that is being non-WASP in America centered around a concept of “third world” experience. Of course, none of this fits neatly into skin color categories. (this isn’t to say that race doesn’t matter – I think it does – but it’s not like everyone can be easily classified into an overarching racial paradigm that is constant in all situations at all points in time). And of course, who gets beat at the end of the day? Oh it would still be the brown/black man!
That said, despite her Laker Girl status, I prefer Shakira to Paula. This is of course based on dance aesthetics, also. Ever since “Straight Up,” I just can’t appreciate Ms. Abdul.
well, obviously a typical person intent on beating the shit out of a ‘sand nigger’ isn’t going to be persuaded by arguments above, they are going to look for the nearest ‘rag head’ and start a beaten’ (that would usually be sikhs). after 9-11 there were stories out of atlanta where black american kids were beating the shit out of sudanese christian refugee boys for being ‘muslim’ (ah, the tragic irony). obviously the kids beating the shit out of the sudanese probably wouldn’t have been persuaded on a discursion into the reality of muslim discrimination against christians in sudan, their typological fallacy.
neverthless, the arguments i made above are important in addressing elite chattering class types. 1) i think overall they are accurate 2) myself, i don’t like being viewed as part of an amorphous ‘non-white’ mass without specificity, i have no problems with arabs, but i am not one 3) the manichaean white vs. non-white dichotomy is i think not totally approriate in all circumstances, especially an america characterized by multiraciality as opposed to biraciality. my contention is that the white vs. non-white dichotomy is a relict of the high tide of european hegemony and racialism around 1900. anti-racists have continued to use this model despite its origins because it increases the number and power of non-whites, but it is 2005, not 1905. we’re 100 years past the russo-japanese war, which shocked the world because the yellow man kicked in the teeth of the white man, and the dragon is rising in the east (china). the world is complex, and it is time to acknowledge that.
well, obviously a typical person intent on beating the shit out of a ‘sand nigger’ isn’t going to be persuaded by arguments above, they are going to look for the nearest ‘rag head’ and start a beaten’ (that would usually be sikhs)
You’re preaching to the (Sikh) choir 🙂
Coming back to Abhi’s post (which I really enjoyed, yay Abhi), the idea of emphasizing aggressive plainsclothes tactics to scare terrorists is a bizarre idea to me. It seems like a militarization of public/civilian space, and I don’t see how scaring people into alertness/compliance would work as a long-term method of security management. I feel pretty confident that no blonde haired blue eyed kid from Nebraska is going to be the target of these procedures. All in all, their plans sound very panopticon-inspired, and are about as attractive/useful as racial profiling (as in, they aren’t).
There’s still confusion over whether a bomb threat was made:
Coming back to Abhi’s post (which I really enjoyed, yay Abhi), the idea of emphasizing aggressive plainsclothes tactics to scare terrorists is a bizarre idea to me. It seems like a militarization of public/civilian space, and I don’t see how scaring people into alertness/compliance would work as a long-term method of security management.
Camille, something about your phrasing suddenly reminded me of the V for Vendetta trailer–where Natalie Portman’s character bumps into someone ordinary-looking in an alley.
“Whoa! Excuse me Miss!”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not yet, you’re not. But you will be. ”
Fear became the ultimate tool of this government. . .”I’m wish I wasn’t afraid, all the time”. . .People should not be afraid of their government. Governments should be afraid of their people.
Before I get accused of frontin’ my comic book cred let me state that I have not yet read V for Vendetta, though it is on the list.
fuck, sheez even hotter with a posh accent.
have you ever wondered why suicide bombers can walk into public places in israel without being noticed? because so many look like “jews.”
I have been told that extra brown men get extra extra security in Israel.
I have been told that extra brown men get extra extra security in Israel.
mebee. but brownness is trivial compared to an arab name. israel does ethnic profiling, my friend who is half-arab looks a lot like many ashkenazi jews (curly brown hair, white skin, hazel eyes) stereotypically but he goes through the gauntlet everytime he visits his father’s family (his father is from nazareth and they are israeli arabs). also, the rankers in the IDF are more likely to be non-ashkenazi, and one of the main parts of israeli society where the beta israel (ethiopians) are prominent is in the IDF, so i would be skeptical of conventional euro-racism arguments….
and of course, the IDF is one of the main places in israeli society where non-ashkenazi jews are anywhere near parity.
Unfortunate incident but if you mention those words on a plane, then that’s it ….. end of story. It’s just a sad thing that this is what America and the world in general has come to.
Agreed Abhi. I have a younger brother who travels all the time and it freaks me out that he’s out there everytime I think of the treatment of brown men in todays world. But this is the world we live in. Is that going to change anytime soon? I don’t think so.
Italians, Israelis and Greeks traditionally don’t have light hair. Does that make them less white? I think this level of speculation/assumption (though not unwarranted) becomes dangerous when we start discussion the treatment of people. Erratic behavior should be viewed as erratic behavior regardless of someones race.
It’s an accurate soundbite! 🙂
My Greek-American friends would argue yes! Coincidentally they also get stopped everytime they fly. They speculate that it’s a combination of the features/skin (which could pass as Middle Eastern) and the hard to pronounce last names.
This is just awful, and NOT SURPRISING. I love that people feel entitled to simply lie, probably because they think they’re “defending their country,” or whatever that means. I give up on America.
I love that people feel entitled to simply lie, probably because they think they’re “defending their country,” or whatever that means.
isn’t that presumptious? shouldn’t we at least wait a few days as more data points come in?
Whether intentional or accidental, claiming to have witnessed something you didn’t see is dishonest. Many instances in which eyewitnesses misreport are cases of people trying to be “helpful.” I’m arguing that that’s not compelling enough to risk endangering someone else’s life and personal freedom. My argument isn’t really time or intentionality dependent. I’m not assuming that the captain was purposefully lying, just that it happens, generally for different (crappy) factors, and that it’s not a useful method of crime prevention.
This is why one has to sit on these things, stay consistent in questions, and get the right answeres.
Critical stress/incident amnesia (after a traumatic event) you may not remember the events as they happened, or not remember them at all. For those of you who’e got into fights, brawls, whatever, how much of that do you actually remember when you’re adrenaline charged up? How much do you remember after a day or so, and say, “Oh shit, that happened, too.”
In the heat of the moment, decisions are very human, despite the best training in the world.
The Orlando Sentinel interviewed seven passengers who said the guy made no bomb threat:
It’s sounding more and more like the only mention of a bomb, if made at all, may be have been on the jetway after he left the plane:
I agree with you, Jane of All Trades. My point was that law enforcement doesn’t always think this way. The same behaviors are viewed differently depending on the race and social location of the person.
It’s the same reason Amadou Diallou (sp?) was shot, the same reason black students get labelled as “disruptive” while white students exhibiting the same behaviors are labelled as “outgoing,” or etc.
It would be interesting to see if a white guy with a Southern or Yank accent would be shot if he did the same on an airplane. My guess is, most probably not.
Folks, as the story goes, he was shot in the jetway for claiming to have a bomb and reaching for it. This is moment one has to focus on, because BOTH FAMS fired at and shot the man.
Killing someone in a law enforcement role is no joke, and something must have triggered the officers into believing that their lives as well as the lives of the people in the area was in danger.
If it [bomb threat] turns out to be true, and the agents felt imminent danger, then as regrettable it is, the shooting becomes justified.
If there was no bomb threat, or any threat at all, then there was a breakdown in training.
I travel quite a bit for work, I’m brown, and for the most part don’t feel any paranoia. I do avoid looking back at the bathroom too many times if there is a line or people are waiting. To claim people shouldn’t get apprehensive is not pragmatic. People do because emotions as are strong part of us.
I’ve seen unruly white guys get taken off planes more often than anyone else. Does that mean anything, probably not. But there are certain places where freaking out has consequences.
A white guy, brown, black, etc. guy getting all crazy, running out, and yelling a bomb threat would get taken down by the FAMS. Period. They are paid to do so in increasing numbers (after 9-11), are equipped to do so (hollow point low velocity rounds) and research continues to move forward in IMMEDIATE elimination of threats (ceramic frangible bullets).
Why aren’t non lethal items used? Because society as a whole has put more VALUE to on an airline incident. It is the safest way to travel. Less accidents, car jackings, whatever problems, less people dying etc. Then why do people freak out when things happen in an Airline incident, even before 9-11?
It is a very result of that percieved protection. You were supposed to be safe here, but you’re not. And not accepting that reality drives people nuts.
We’re spending $300B in Iraq, but we’re not screening most baggage for explosives. Stupid, stupid, stupid:
This is very much like Dubya’s under-funding of port security. It completely baffles me. These are the nuts and bolts of antiterror.