September 22, 2003
Recently, I read an article in one of the dailies, written by a young woman of Middle Eastern descent, who complained about racial profiling at airports. The article was dramatically entitled My carry-on luggage is fear, and it related in great detail how she was always singled out by the brutes at Customs and Immigration for special treatment.
Given the events of the past few years, I don’t see anything wrong with racial profiling. In fact, I don’t think we’re doing nearly enough of it. The FBI in New York had open files on various Muslim and Arab individuals as early as 1991, but abandoned them because of misguided political correctness. In the end, these individuals were convicted of the 1993 truck bombing of the World Trade Centre, as well as of being involved in the assassination of Rabbi Meyer Kahane. Had the FBI continued their surveillance of these subjects, the first World Trade Centre incident might never have happened.
I believe the events of September 11, 2001 might also have turned out differently had we enlisted the aid of a little common sense. Actor James Woods was on a flight from New York to Los Angeles two months prior to 9/11. On the flight with him were six men of Middle Eastern descent who acted awfully suspicious. So suspicious, in fact, that Woods alerted the authorities at LAX. The authorities did absolutely nothing. When the pictures of the 9/11 highjackers were finally made public, Woods was able to identify the six that were on his flight two months previous.
Another well-known case in point is that of Zechariahs Moussaoui, the so-called 20th highjacker currently awaiting trial in the U.S. An FBI agent in the bureau’s St. Louis office was given specific directions to not pursue an investigation of Moussaoui prior to 9/11 for fear that the bureau might be accused of racial profiling.
Here’s a good argument that political correctness might be harmful or fatal. We have credible information that individuals of Middle Eastern origin have a propensity to highjack aircrafts and blow themselves, as well as the other passengers, to smithereens. Yet, we are reluctant to single out individuals who fit this description for fear of not being nice.
Instead we do random searches of 85-year-old grannies from Duluth, or young mothers with babies attempting to carry on bottles of breast milk. When we do single out an individual that fits the "profile" of a terrorist, the peanut gallery begins its usual and well-rehearsed wailing and gnashing of their teeth about the evils of racial profiling.
No one is suggesting that we go out and round up all Muslims, or people from the Middle East, and lock them up in camps. However, given the evidence available to us to date, one would think that an Arab-looking person would feel safer being singled out by airport security. To complain about being racially profiled in this case has to be the ultimate narcissism. Would it be better to check no one, or should we check everyone, no matter how long it takes or how unlikely it seems that everyone could be a Middle Eastern terrorist? If there was credible evidence that middle-aged white guys were banding together to commit atrocities with highjacked aircrafts, then I would want the authorities to take a close look at each and every one of us as we boarded. In fact, I would be demanding to be profiled. How else could I be sure that I have more than a 50-50 chance at arriving at my destination safely?