# Legislation to allow racial profiling of Arabs **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 2, 2005, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314 "2005-08-02T16:04:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/41 "2005-08-03T19:09:00Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > I never said that ONE factor should be used. To your point, I don’t think that one factor–like skin color in a city as diverse as NY–wold get the pool small enought to be actionable. But if you are going to attempt to create a “profile” so law enforcement resources can be applied more efficiently, then yes, race should be one, as should religion. I no it’s taboo, but look who’s been committing these acts. Since we’re specifically discussing proposed legislation that would be applied to the what are currently random bag searches, it’s going to have to be limited to physical appearances. What race are we looking at and what does a Muslim look like? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/42 "2005-08-03T19:24:32Z")
As soon as we say, “we won’t be searching people who look like X,” we’re telling would be terrorists, “use people who look like X.” It’s stupid to give them a safe “look” that will give them a free pass on being searched. And using “religion” as a criterion? How can you tell what religion somebody is just by looking at them? Which religions are safe and which ones are dangerous? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/43 "2005-08-03T19:36:47Z")
One more thing…people do realize that there are millions of Muslims who are not Arab, don’t they? Do they know that there are black African Muslims? Asian Muslims? WHITE Muslims (and not just a few. Anglo-Muslims abound in Eastern Europe). Limiting our choice of suspects only to those who conform to a narrow, sterotyped image of an Arabic Muslim with a turban is a really, REALLY stupid idea for reasons that go far beyond merely respecting the rights of ordinary, non-criminal Muslims (who are the vast majority)…not that respecting the rights and humanity of Arabic Muslims is not, in itself, a good enough reason not to profile. ---
**Author:** ![rayh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@rayh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayh)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/44 "2005-08-03T19:40:45Z")
Profiling won’t work as a method of stopping terrorists, as I pointed out in post 31. All you have to do is determine how the profile works, and then either alter your appearence to not conform to the profile or recruit people that do not fit the profile. Profiling wouldn’t have worked to stop the 9/11 terrorist action. They had a dry run before the actual event. If they had been stopped because of the profile they would just have tried some other way. The problem is by concentrating too much on what your profile says your terrorist looks like, you are leaving yourself unprotected against terrorists that do not conform to your profile. You seem to be be looking for middle-eastern males between 18 and 40. Soe [here](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/uk/05/london_blasts/investigation/html/bombers.stm) are pictures of the men who carried out the bombings on 7/7. One of the men, Germaine Lindsay, was born in Jamaica so now you have to add Afro-Carribbean to your profile. The men who attempted to carry out the bombings or 27/7 are [here.](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/uk/05/london_blasts/investigation/html/suspects.stm) So tell me what your profile looks like now? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/45 "2005-08-03T20:07:14Z")
> [@rayh](#): > > Profiling won’t work as a method of stopping terrorists, as I pointed out in post 31. All you have to do is determine how the profile works, and then either alter your appearence to not conform to the profile or recruit people that do not fit the profile. Profiling wouldn’t have worked to stop the 9/11 terrorist action. They had a dry run before the actual event. If they had been stopped because of the profile they would just have tried some other way. And I’ve already pointed out that “all you have to do” is factually incorrect. It’s not at all easy to recruit different people, and the mere fact of changing the recruitment strategy can easily expose the organizers to intelligence efforts to capture them. > [@DMC](#): > > Even if that was true, and even if it remained true in the future (I disagree, but I’ll play along), what does a young Muslim man look like? > > Want to bet that John would get through security without a hitch if this profiling is implemented? > > What are the chances of Michael catching the attention of one of our eagle-eyed profilers? > > Which of these kids are going to be searched due to fitting the profile? Once again, a system does not have to work perfectly in order to be more effective than no system at all. Should bars stop carding people who look underage because there are plenty of underage people who look much older than they are? Of course you can find exceptions. No system is pefect, and to demand perfection is to be paralyzed into inaction. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/46 "2005-08-03T20:18:31Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Once again, a system does not have to work perfectly in order to be more effective than no system at all. Should bars stop carding people who look underage because there are plenty of underage people who look much older than they are? Of course you can find exceptions. No system is pefect, and to demand perfection is to be paralyzed into inaction. Unless you know of a bar that has such limited resources that they can only spot check IDs, this isn’t a very good analogy. Plus, we know for a fact that all persons under the age of 21 are too young to enter a bar, and that all persons 21 and over are not too young. There is no grey area in your situation. Are all young muslims terrorists? Are all people who are not young muslims not terrorists? Are all people who “look” middle eastern Muslims? Are all people who look like magellan01 not Muslims? The entire point of profiling is to conserve resources (except for those situations where it’s pure harassment based on bigotry, but that’s another topic). Most of us are just pointing out that there are major problems with focusing on a single vaguely defined, and thus far in this thread, indescribable group, as opposed to sticking to searching people at random (which I’m also against, but that’s irrelevant to topic in the OP). Feel free to tell us how exactly you’d limit your search, and we’ll gladly show you a potential terrorist that got through because of your profiling. We’ve been doing it this entire thread. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/47 "2005-08-03T21:12:19Z")
> [@DMC](#): > > Feel free to tell us how exactly you’d limit your search, and we’ll gladly show you a potential terrorist that got through because of your profiling. We’ve been doing it this entire thread. Strawman. If fact, I’ve said that no profiling system is going to catch all terrorists. I don’t care if you can show me a potential terrorist that can slip thru. We know that some will. However, to the extent that we know the recruiting base for Al Qaeda (which is deabtable, but I’d say we have a pretty good idea of what it is) and assuming we can eliminate some groups as being highly unlikely to be part of that base, then we can go from there. If there was a militia movement in the US recruiting large groups of young, white males to detonate bombs in public places, I’d be happy to profile young white males as well. The fact that policemen might confuse an Hispanic with a Middle Easterner isn’t a valid reason to say that profiling Middle Easterners is ineffective. It might be LESS effective, but this isn’t about being perfect, it’s about being better than random. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/48 "2005-08-03T21:21:05Z")
I haven’t seen evidence that profiling will catch ANY terrorists nor a response to the point that designating any group as “safe” is just an invitation to terrorists to use that precise group as a subterfuge. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/49 "2005-08-03T22:01:48Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > If there was a militia movement in the US recruiting large groups of young, white males to detonate bombs in public places, I’d be happy to profile young white males as well. The fact that policemen might confuse an Hispanic with a Middle Easterner isn’t a valid reason to say that profiling Middle Easterners is ineffective. It might be LESS effective, but this isn’t about being perfect, it’s about being better than random. And if you did start profiling young white males, the militia movement could change their carriers, either in gender, age, or appearnace. It’s not like this profiling talk is happening in a vacuum. Do you really think Richard Reid, Joseph Padilla, John Lindh, etc. are/were the only non-arabs in their ranks? Besides, I still haven’t seen anyone in this thread answer the question of how one tells who these potential terrorists are, so even if they don’t start recruiting 80 year old white ladies, I haven’t seen how we’re going to make this work. There, I’ll ask you the same thing I asked magellan01. What race are we looking at and what does a Muslim look like? ---
**Author:** ![Dead\_Badger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/848f3c/32.png) [@Dead\_Badger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dead_Badger)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/50 "2005-08-03T22:12:09Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Strawman. If fact, I’ve said that no profiling system is going to catch all terrorists. I don’t care if you can show me a potential terrorist that can slip thru. Why not? Your entire rebuttal of our collective point is that it’s very difficult for terrorists to find someone who avoids the profile. We have shown many examples that do, but you declare them irrelevant. Why? ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/51 "2005-08-03T22:44:48Z")
> [@DMC](#): > > Since we’re specifically discussing proposed legislation that would be applied to the what are currently random bag searches, it’s going to have to be limited to physical appearances. > > What race are we looking at and what does a Muslim look like? Like the 19 terrorists responsible for 911. And WTC '93. And the Marine barracks in Beirut. And the Achille Lauro. And the U.S. embassy bombings. Etc. Now maybe you can help me. Would you agree that a a blonde grandmother of Icelandic descent does NOT look anything like them? And that she looks NOTHING LIKE anyone that we can point to that has had anything to do with terrorism? If you agree with these two statements, can we agree on NOT checking her? If not, why? ---
**Author:** ![rayh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@rayh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayh)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/52 "2005-08-03T22:52:36Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Like the 19 terrorists responsible for 911. And WTC '93. And the Marine barracks in Beirut. And the Achille Lauro. And the U.S. embassy bombings. Etc. > > Now maybe you can help me. > > Would you agree that a a blonde grandmother of Icelandic descent does NOT look anything like them? And that she looks NOTHING LIKE anyone that we can point to that has had anything to do with terrorism? > > If you agree with these two statements, can we agree on NOT checking her? If not, why? And what about the pictures I posted of the terrorists that attacked London recently? Where is your profile there? We cannot agree to not check your Icelandic grandmother. Can she not be disguised? Can she not be unwittlngly carrying a bomb? Can the terrorists not now start recruiting people who look like Icelandic grandmothers? Are we just looking for Muslim terrorists or all terrorists? ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/53 "2005-08-03T23:00:37Z")
> [@rjung](#): > > **Magiver,** why did you cherry-pick incidents to reflect your conclusions while ignoring terrorist incidents which don’t fit your racial profiling scheme, such as the Oklahoma Federal Building bombing, or the Washington DC sniper attacks, or the still-unidentified anthrax mailings? Because your examples were isolated incidences independent of a larger conspiracy. But mostly because your examples didn’t declare war against the United States and her allies. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/54 "2005-08-03T23:22:22Z")
> [@Harborwolf](#): > > What we are looking to do in the NYC subway is to search more people of a certain skin color because we think they may be more likely to commit a possible attack. In Magellano1s example we had a definite suspect in mind because we saw who committed it. Unless Precrime sprang up overnight, we don’t even know if the terrorists are going to bomb our trains and what ethnicity they will be when it happens. That is not how profiling works. Profiling involves observing known traits of an individual or group until common characteristics are observed. It is not a single trait or a couple of traits but rather a series of traits. The traits can be anything. The more observable conditions that are met the higher the probablility of success. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/55 "2005-08-03T23:41:05Z")
> [@rayh](#): > > And what about the pictures I posted of the terrorists that attacked London recently? Where is your profile there? > > We cannot agree to not check your Icelandic grandmother. Can she not be disguised? Can she not be unwittlngly carrying a bomb? Can the terrorists not now start recruiting people who look like Icelandic grandmothers? Are we just looking for Muslim terrorists or all terrorists? First of all, Just because a certain tactic might work in the US doesn’t mean that it would work elsewhere. For profiling to _work_, you have to be able to focus on a small enough group. Maybe it wouldn’t work in London. It certainly wouldn’t work in Iraq. Maybe it won’t work in NYC. Maybe it would work in Chicago or San Francisco. Similarly, it might make sense to “profile” people with red hair and blue eyes in Guatamala, but not in Ireland. As far as your link with the pictures, it was just as I suspected. Not one of them looks like a blonde Icelandic grandmother. And your reason for not wanting to exclude blonde Icelandic grandmothers is because they can be disguised? Yeah, I guess it’s possible. And if the terrorists were to adopt that tactic, then the “profile” of middle-eastern male in his 20s would not be effective and should be abandoned. Until then, you’re contorting the real world. An escaped convict on drugs wielding a machete could be waiting outside your door for you right now. So, don’t leave your house, ever. He _could_ be there. I mean, it is possible. Right? Let me ask you, how would apportion these reasons why we should NOT profile: 1. It won’t work 2. it is offensive Is it 50-50. 90-10, 25-75? Please elborate. I’m really trying to understand the thinking against it. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/56 "2005-08-03T23:42:23Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Like the 19 terrorists responsible for 911. And WTC '93. And the Marine barracks in Beirut. And the Achille Lauro. And the U.S. embassy bombings. Etc. You didn’t answer the question, and each of the terrorists looked different to me. Be specific. If you had to write up a functional profiling document for the searches on the NYC subway system, how would you word it? If you were to teach the officers how to identify the target group, how would you do so? How does one recognize a Muslim? > [@](#): > > Now maybe you can help me. > > Would you agree that a a blonde grandmother of Icelandic descent does NOT look anything like them? And that she looks NOTHING LIKE anyone that we can point to that has had anything to do with terrorism? Should we default to profiling everyone, and then eliminate certain classes that we decide are immune from searches? Doesn’t seem to save a lot of resources. > [@](#): > > If you agree with these two statements, can we agree on NOT checking her? If not, why? I can agree with not checking her. I also agree with not checking anyone at all. Hell, under the current set of rules they have set forth for the searches (and I don’t see how the potential outcome would change if they engaged in profiling), not checking at all is just as effective. I’m not the one who wants us to check anyone. You are and you want it to be limited to a subset of people. I told you to define that subset in a manner that could actually be put into practice. You haven’t. Time to put up. ---
**Author:** ![rayh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@rayh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayh)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/57 "2005-08-03T23:51:45Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Let me ask you, how would apportion these reasons why we should NOT profile: > > 1. It won’t work > 2. it is offensive > > Is it 50-50. 90-10, 25-75? Please elborate. I’m really trying to understand the thinking against it. Maggie, my main objection is that I don’t believe it would work. Once a terrorist works out you are looking for a particular profile then they will take steps to evade your profile. As a concept a believe profiling works after a crime has been committed, but not as a crime prevention method. The other problem I have is that unless you can narrow your profile sufficiently, you are liable to piss off a lot of innocent people. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/58 "2005-08-04T00:23:09Z")
> [@rayh](#): > > Maggie, > my main objection is that I don’t believe it would work. Once a terrorist works out you are looking for a particular profile then they will take steps to evade your profile. As a concept a believe profiling works after a crime has been committed, but not as a crime prevention method. The other problem I have is that unless you can narrow your profile sufficiently, you are liable to piss off a lot of innocent people. You’re right that terrorists would change tactics if the profile parameters were known. True profiling is both complex and ever changing. It’s not based on appearance and it’s not static. You can have many branches of parameters. Person A could be tagged because they were ethnically A, wearing clothing B, with accent C, exhibiting behavior D, Religion X, etc… Person B could be tagged because they arrived from Country A, carrying books written by author J, exhibiting behavior E, smoking cigarettes that are only found in province K. I realize this is a simplistic example but that’s what profiling is all about. As you acquire more markers of commonality the likelihood goes up that the person should be looked at more closely. It’s not perfect but it increases the odds of stopping a larger percentage of attackers before they strike. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/59 "2005-08-04T01:00:44Z")
The (paraphrased) words of the Assemblyman from the OP: > [@](#): > > Hikind said police should focus on young Middle Easterners called and called it - insane - to look for bombs in the bags of 75-year-old grandmothers. > > Racial profiling is illegal, but Hikind says he will introduce legislation to remove that prohibition. There is nothing in what he proposes that will do anything to improve safety. While a case can be made for the sort of more sophisticated profiling that is carried out in searches for particular types of people, his “young Middle Easterners” would not have caught Jose Padilla or Richard Reid or any number of other people who have been linked to terrorism, but who have no Middle Eastern connections. Several of the WTC hijackers could easily have “passed” as Europeans. “Insane” to check the bags of 75-year-old grandmothers? Perhaps–so far. Yet the profile for suicide bombers in the Middle East has begun to include young women and teenagers. How long before some terrorist offers to pay the family debts of a cancer-ridden elder to slip past all the officials looking for “young Middle Easterners”? It is simply stupid “feel-good” racism (ironic as that is). ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314/60 "2005-08-04T01:13:44Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > The (paraphrased) words of the Assemblyman from the OP:There is nothing in what he proposes that will do anything to improve safety. While a case can be made for the sort of more sophisticated profiling that is carried out in searches for particular types of people, his “young Middle Easterners” would not have caught Jose Padilla or Richard Reid or any number of other people who have been linked to terrorism, but who have no Middle Eastern connections. Several of the WTC hijackers could easily have “passed” as Europeans. > > “Insane” to check the bags of 75-year-old grandmothers? Perhaps–so far. Yet the profile for suicide bombers in the Middle East has begun to include young women and teenagers. How long before some terrorist offers to pay the family debts of a cancer-ridden elder to slip past all the officials looking for “young Middle Easterners”? > > It is simply stupid “feel-good” racism (ironic as that is). No real disagreement with what you’ve said based on what the article stated. I may have read more into it by assuming it would be impossible to propose legislation as suggested in the article. The actual science/art of profiling has always been used in law enforcement and should continue. My personal preference would be to search everyone but the need for that has not yet surfaced. I’m never to busy to prevent terrorism. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/legislation-to-allow-racial-profiling-of-arabs/315314.md?page=4)