Bryan Fischer says officials were right to be suspicious of Ahmed Mohamed's clock b/c his father is a devout Muslim: http://t.co/d2QtDqEi4G
— Right Wing Watch (@RightWingWatch) September 18, 2015
Irving Police Chief Larry Boyd refused to say on Thursday that his officers erred in arresting 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed on Monday even though they allegedly knew he did not bring a bomb to his high school. MSNBC host Chris Hayes gave Boyd the opportunity to admit to a mistake, while conceding that people understood that officers need to be on high alert regarding possible attacks against a school. However, Hayes said, “I think it’s hard for folks watching this from the outside, seeing this all link up, seeing this kid — who seems like a tremendously poised, bright, genuine kid — be put through this. To not hear from anyone in officialdom down there that ‘Yeah, we didn’t get this one right.’”…. Mohamed was taken out of MacArthur High School in handcuffs on Monday after being accused of making a “hoax bomb” and bringing it to school.While the community’s anti-Muslim mayor has also defended his arrest, the freshman quickly gained support online as well as from both President Barack Obama’s administration and the academic world.
Among the silliness Erin and I missed while we were gallivanting through Iceland and Norway was the sad, silly saga of 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed. An extremely intelligent kid brings a clock he’d made to school to show a teacher…and he’s arrested for making a bomb. Really? IF Ahmed Mohamed HAD made a bomb, does anyone REALLY think someone so bright and precocious would bring it to school to show a teacher? Wouldn’t he just put it in a locker or somewhere inconspicuous and walk away? Never mind that police knew what they were dealing with wasn’t a bomb…and yet, because all Muslims are presumed to be terrorists, here we are.
Try as I might, it’s difficult to escape the conclusion that Mohamed’s only crime was “being smart while brown.” Though police and school officials knew straight away that they’d screwed the pooch, their response was to obfuscate the particulars and make it look as if they’d responded to a legitimate threat. That charges against Mohamed were eventually dropped speaks to the degree of silliness and racism evident in the overreaction of both police and MacArthur High School officials. A letter sent by the school to parents urged them to take the opportunity to review the school’s Code of Conduct, which states that bringing dangerous items to school is verboten. Not an apology for a horrible, ridiculous overreaction. Not an admission that this should never have gone as far as it did. No, they continued to portray the incident in a way clearly implying Mohamed was responsible for this predicament. To say that police and school officials should be ashamed of their conduct doesn’t begin to do justice to the depths of their depravity and insensitivity. And that, kids, concludes today’s lesson in racism, insensitivity, and hypocrisy…at least until the family’s lawyers have their say.
There was nothing dangerous about Ahmed Mohamed’s clock…except for the fact that that he’s Muslim, and, of course, any Muslim designing something that White teachers can’t understand by definition MUST be a bomb, right?? Making matters even worse is that some Conservatives are arguing that the response to Ahmed Mohamed’s arrest was a setup by terrorist sympathizers to make the anti-Islam lobby appear racist.
The anti-Islam lobby racist? Hey, if the shoe fits….
Unsurprisingly, Mohamed says he won’t return to MacArthur H.S. I smell a lawsuit, and he and his family deserve to be compensated handsomely for the embarrassing overreaction that saw their son arrested and handcuffed. Despite the lengths that police and school officials are going to in order to absolve themselves of responsibility, “being smart while brown” isn’t a crime. Racist, stupidity, and self-righteousness should be.
Anti-Muslim conservatives are coalescing around a narrative to push against national outrage about the arrest of a 14-year-old boy who built a clock and brought it to school.
While more libertarian-minded conservatives blamed the incident on “zero tolerance” policies — and not racism or xenophobia — others are warning the incident is a “setup” intended to keep Americans from being Islamophobic enough.
“What the president did, Sandra, by elevating this story to national attention, is he basically got rid of ‘if you see something, say something,’” said Fox News host Andrea Tarantos, apparently forgetting that President Barack Obama reached out to the Texas teen after his arrest made national news.
Pamela Geller — who organized an anti-Islam art contest earlier this year in Garland, near the teen’s home in Irving — also claimed the ninth grader’s arrest was part of a plot by Obama to undermine national security.
“This story is pure agitprop most fatal,” Geller warned. “‘If you see something, say something’ is now racism.”
What Geller and Tantaros have chosen to willfully ignore is that “see something, say something” was never intended as a means to oppress those whose only “crime” is being Muslim. They ignore at least seven cases where White students brought clocks they’d made to school…except they were treated as intellectual heroes, not potential terrorists.
Because, as ANY good, God-fearing, White patriot will tell you, ALL Muslims are terrorists. White folks? While they may have anger management issues, they by definition can’t be terrorists. Never mind that an American is far more likely to die on American soil from an attack conducted by a domestic (i.e.- WHITE) terrorist than from one of the Islamofascist variety. Then again, truth is almost always the first casualty when the anti-Islam lobby weighs in.
The growing smear campaign against Ahmed Mohamed http://t.co/hZFkndfAmT pic.twitter.com/06tRfLn1uh
— ThinkProgress (@thinkprogress) September 21, 2015
Despite all attempts to deflect blame and turn Ahmed Mohamed into the poster child for terrorism, there was no crime committed- except that committed against decency and fairness by police and school officials. Mohamed’s arrest can and should be laid squarely at the feet of racists who can’t be bothered to accept that being Muslim is not ipso facto proof of terrorist intent. Nor is being a follower of Islam a crime.
Ahmed Mohamed and his family are every bit as American as those “patriots” who hate Islam and presume all Muslims to be terrorists looking for a place to happen. If Mohamed was White, this travesty never would have happened, but because he’s clearly guilty of “being smart while brown,” here we are. Rather than admitting to a horrible overreaction and an egregious miscarriage of justice, police, school officials, and Conservatives are deflecting blame onto a 14-year-old boy who only wanted to impress a teacher.
Stay classy, eh??
