That was very helpful thanks.
I’d say the reports of the Imam gathering tomorrow with interfaith religious leaders to protest prejudice at the airport also indicates it was he was sincere and the airline was wrong. Other than that there wasn’t much information offered and IMO it could go either way.
Not to hurt your feelings but that alien thing seems a little far fetched.
You make a good point and normally I’m that way too. I should have noticed those buzz words. I wasn’t familiar with the sites by name. I suppose I’m being too cynical. What I quoted is a bit of information that could be verified and I’ll point out that I didn’t accept it as fact simply because it was posted.
As I said, my doubt is based on my own life experience of dealing with the public and see too many people dishonestly play the wronged victim in order to manipulate the situation. Because of that experience I don’t accept things as they first appear. I like to check things out and get more info before I come to a conclusion.
Was Rosa Parks “looking for trouble” and did she get what she deserved?
Hmmmm I’m trying to see your point. You must admit there is a difference between the kind of racism that relegates people to the back of the bus and people fearing for their lives. Rosa sitting on the bus didn’t threaten anybody.
I certainly believe prejudice should be challenged and if Muslim Americans are feeling it I’m all for them protesting and trying to educate others about their religion. America can’t blame their discomfort with Arab men on 9/11. We need to work together to promote cultural understanding, peace, and *mutual *respect. Neither should we leave ourselves or others vulnerable because we’re afraid to offend someone. You don’t cave to the irrational fears of others in pursuing your way of life, but that doesn’t require purposely provoking those fears.
Are you saying that even if they were trying to instigate something it was probably to expose racism and prejudice? I can accept that if they went about their normal business. No one should be profiled just for praying to Allah any more than Buddha or Jesus. My issue is the conflicting reports afterwards. If they did purposely try to provoke a response then it appears they lied about it afterwards and I don’t honor or respect that in the way I do what Rosa Parks did.
What are the conflicting reports?
The group “admits” that three of them prayed in public.
Condemnations of U.S. policies in Iraq do not seem to be confined to people from the Middle East.
The claims that the seat belt extensdions were “suspicious” have been photographically proven to be nonsense.
None were wearing Eastern clothing.
None were among the “young” demographic typical of hijackers.
They all spoke English (except in the prayer which requires recitation in Arabic).
There has been no contradiction that they were denied a flight on a later plane.
The claims that they had one-way tickets appears to have been an unsubstantiated (and perhaps malicious) rumor (that the airline has failed to support with an entire week to do so).
How loud were they? They claimed they made an effort to be quiet while a couple of reports said people were surprised by how loud they were. I don’t know much about the Muslim prayer rituals to judge how loud they have to be for prayers to count.
Of course, but given the current atmosphere it doesn’t seem wise. In fact in some reports they flatly denied doing so. So I’d like to know if they did or not, and if they lied about it after the fact.
I don’t quite get that myself. The picture I saw of four only one appeared to need any sort of exstention. What pictures did you see?
Relevant? Did anyone claim that made them suspicious?
How young is young? Again, the picture I saw of four of them walking to their NE flight at least three looked plenty young enough.
Again, relevance. Did anyone cite this as a reason for suspicion except openly criticizing the US and mentioning Saddam, which they denied.
I’d like to hear anything from the airline as to why they were denied another flight.
Working with the public I’ve seen a few ugly scenes that resulted in a both sides deciding not to do business with each other.
The conflicts that make me wonder are
Did they openly criticize US Arab relations in a boarding area, and /or mention Saddam? Certainly they have the right to do so but considering all you said about their extra measures to not cause problems it seems like a conflict to me that doesn’t make sense.
How loud were they when they prayed? Some said it seemed loud while they insisted they made every effort to be unobtrusive.
Did they cooperate when asked to exit the flight for more screening?
Was the flight delayed while that happened and for how long?
What was the confrontation like between them and airline officials after they left the flight and how did that influence the decision not to fly them at all?
Specifically, I’d like some more info to decide if they are telling the truth. I’d like to hear from other passengers and crew members.
Reading that the lead Imam is meeting tomorrow at the airport with an interfaith council to help combat profiling and discrimination counts as credibility points for the Imam IMO.
Silence from the airline may indicate no good explanation available but as I mentioned before. Some businesses have a “don’t talk about” policy in order to make incidents like this fade away as quickly as possible. For them any publicity keeping the question of prejudice in the headlines is bad.
I’ve spent a lot of posts just defending the idea that maybe, and thats maybe there are other possibilities. I’m not condemning anyone or defending anyone. I’ve just seen enough to not jump to conclusions based on very limited evidence.
Her point is that Parks’ deservedly lauded refusal to move to the back of the bus was a carefully orchestrated protest. She sat in the front, and refused to move, precisely to provoke outrage and controversy over a prejudicial policy. And the Imams didn’t threaten anybody, either. People felt threatened by them, and decided that was sufficient reason to treat them differently than anyone else trying to get on that plane. Yes, people are afraid of Muslims, and given the events of recent years, that’s understandable. But that doesn’t make these sorts of actions acceptable. Being afraid is not an excuse to treat people like second class citizens, to harrass and detain and refuse them service. Fear is not an excuse for bigotry. There is no excuse for bigotry. Trying to defend the actions of the airline by pointing to the 9/11 hijackers doesn’t mitigate the airline’s actions at all. It merely compounds them, by adding “cowardice” to the crime of “prejudice.”
Incidentally, I have to wonder why you even bother to read the news. The standard of evidence you’re demanding here before making any sort of a judgement on this issue is so absurdly high, I have trouble thinking of any incident where it could possibly be met. Assuming, of course, that you apply the same standard when talking about other issues.
I have already noted that there is probably a matter of perception, here, but after the initial report, there has been no subsequent claim by anyone that they were actually loud enough to be disruptive.
Only two belts were reported requested for six people. The gentleman in yellow certainly needs one. The gentleman in the blue shirt to his left could apparently use one or the second belt might have been requested for someone not in the picture. However, the airline attendant made the obviously bogus claim: http://www.startribune.com/462/story/826056-a827430-t3.html
Beyond that was the apparent lie that they had one-way tickets.
There is simply nothing in the worst depictions of their actions that appears to rationalize the actions of the airline and the fact that the airline then refused to re-book them and airline employees have lied about events tips the scales toward unwarranted harrassment in my mind. They made no threats. There is nothing “suspicious” in their actions.
Even if they were hoping to provoke an incident, the incident could have been avoided by simply treating them as paying customers rather than acting as though anyone who is “not like us” is a threat to the nation.
Thats fine. What prejudicial policy do you think they were protesting? My question stands. Did they go above and beyond normal behavior to provoke the incident? If they did in order to draw attention to a very real problem thats okay by me. If they lied about it afterwards in order to further punish the airline then I object to their methods.
Is being concerned and heightened security measures enough reason to ask them to leave the plane for additional screening? If they refuse to cooperate what are the choices? If a passenger passes a note should they ignore it? Given todays atmosphere I don’t see how they can. The note didn’t say “Alert!! Arab men on board. Several said Allah out loud.” Once “acting suspiciously” is added I think the airline is compelled to look into it.
Refusing them service after the fact is another issue but we have very little info about that. Virtually none from the airline. I’ve dealt with the public for years and seen how ugly it can get when policy dictates you have to give customers some bad news, like" I’m sorry I have to ask you to exit the plane"
I think it would have been smart of the airline to apologize and book them on other flights and have said so several times. My initial thought was that the confrontation could have gotten so ugly that US air said . “Thats it, You’re not flying with us period.” I don’t think thats smart but it may have been anger rather than just prejudice which seems to be what you’re assuming. What happens to any passenger that refuses to cooperate with airline personnel?
In my store if I give a customer bad news and he reacts with anger I can ask him to leave and certainly refuse to serve him. If he’s black, Arab, Latino, or Chinese he might swear it was prejudice and even sue us but that doesn’t automatically make it so.
I don’t agree. Saying I’m willing to hear from other passengers, airline employees and executives rather than accept the comments of the Imam without question doesn’t seem absurd to me. From my own experiences I’ve learned that things are rarely as one sided as they seem.
Years ago at Sears we had several people who deliberately acted as if they were shop lifting so they would be detained and then sued the company. We also had a guy who looked for something out of place so he could trip and fall down and sue the company. That kind of stuff has made me cynical and cautious of judging without further details.
I’ve read a dozen or more reports and the details vary. That tells me I have to take those details with a grain of salt.
If there’s enough evidence for you then fine. If there a law suit then hopefully you won’t be involved, in the interests of justice.
Just a little? 
Look, the point was that while agnosticsm and skepticism are fine things in general, insisting that we make no judgements whatsoever until we have perfect knowledge is not very helpful. My alien hypothesis was simply a hyperbolic example of where that thinking can lead us: To a complete paralysis of judgement where any theory is as good as any other. We have some information in this case and all the information we have now does not suggest it could go either way. It goes one way: to a conclusion that the airline was behaving unreasonably and with bigotry.
This isn’t a court of inquiry, it’s a message board. We make do with publicly available information. As the information changes, so do our conclusions.
cosmosdan, perchance you could give us a bullet list–minus the stuff you’re obivously making up–of what your points are on this issue?
I haven’t seen any national news service really go after the details of this. I think they should. It’s a serious issue. More so that Kramer’s rant or Brittney’s divorce. It seems there has been little effort to really go after the details. There were over 100 other passengers. Interviewing them would answer a few questions.
One report I read said three. Could a seat bely exstention be used as a weapon? I guess so.
I don’t know how tall he is but I’m as round as that and have never needed one. The report I read said they were for the obese, not just overweight.
[QUOTE]
. The gentleman in the blue shirt to his left could apparently use one or the second belt might have been requested for someone not in the picture.
Because of how the details vary from article to article I wouldn’t assume anyone was intentionally lying. It’s possible, but it also looks like those reporting in the articles were not taking much time to verify the details. Otherwise they wouldn’t vary so much.
I understand and I recognize that it may be exactly that. I simply pointed out that based on the limited info and my own experiences, there are other possibilities.
It seems to have started with the note. Was the passing of that note the airlines prejudice or another passengers? Did they hope to provoke something like that? As I said, I would guess that once a note like that has been passed the airline was obliged to at least look into it. I can imagine it going downhill from there.
One report said the entire flight was delayed for several hours and other passengers were re screened as part of security policy. If thats true it seems it wasn’t a case of “yank the Arabs off the plane and send those like us on its way”
Those are the kinds of details I’d like to know more about.
That being the case it makes me wonder why so many are on my case about simply saying “I’m not so sure” and I don’t think it’s as obvious as you do" I’m not telling anyone else to withhold judgment. I’m simply expressing my own and offering other scenarios.
People seem bothered by the fact that I don’t draw the same conclusions from very sketchy details, and that in some way means I’m defending racial profiling and bigotry. Pardon me but thats total bullshit.
My judgment isn’t paralyzed just because I recognize other possibilities.
Accusing someone of bigotry may feel righteous and all and I accept the sincerity of most posters here. It’s a serious enough thing to me that I won’t do it without further details. I have however admitted several times that that may be exactly what happened, but for some reason that doesn’t seem good enough.
Tuff shit says I
This is also one of my points, but better said.
It explains better why ideas that are arguments from ignorance are made: precisely to cause confusion and in the end it turns into a plea for all to shut up even if the evidence does point to prejudice, cowardice or mistakes.
The best **cosmosdan ** has done is to bring conflicting unreliable evidence from rotten right wing sites. Sorry, but in this case there where further details: an interrogation and release were authorities found several accusations the passengers and the airline made were wrong at best. The press following the Imams after their release did not contradict that they were denied service by the airline after being searched again.
We can not make a judgment on what the best excuse from the airline will be, what I see from this discussion so far is that all the ideas proposed to defend (or not to defend) the airline are weak.
“If you look too Muslim, we won’t let you fly on our airplanes.”
I’m not sure what you’re asking. From the accounts we’ve seen so far, from both sides of the dispute, nothing in their behavior was remotely abnormal. Nothing that they did would have earned a second glance had it been done by someone who was not identifiably Muslim, or at least Middle Eastern. What was “above and beyond normal behavior” in this instance, do you think?
Which has absolutely nothing to do with wether the way they were treated was fair or appropriate. It also, given the facts of the case as we know them, seems highly unlikely. If they’d wanted to provoke a controversy, I think they would have done a lot more to act controversial. It’s also worth noting that none of the Imams statements have been shown to be lies so far. tomndebb has shown several of the statements issues by the airlines to be… let’s be charitable and call them “less than completely accurate.” At what point do you stop floating the, “What if the Imams are all lying?” hypothetical?
No, they shouldn’t have ignored the note. Up until it became clear that the “suspicious activity” reported by the passenger was, indeed, “Several Arab men said Allah out loud.” At that point, they should have been apologized to and allowed to reboard their plane. Maybe with an upgrade to first class thrown in. Instead they were questioned further, and refused passage on any other flight, while the airline tries desperatly to spin this as a legitimate security risk, and not the act of base bigotry that it clearly was.
No, it is not a seperate issue at all. It is the whole of the issue with the airline. No one is blaming them for acting on a warning. What is at issue is how they acted after they had ascertained that the warning was baseless. There is no excuse for that at all, and it is telling that none has been offered. Yes, we can spin “what if” scenarios until the cows come home. Yours has about as much evidence to support it as Larry Borgia’s space aliens, which is the point you seem to have failed to derive from his post.
And when he makes that charge, do you stand there quietly and let it go unrebutted, or do you point out that you refused him service because he was screaming insults at you? The airline has not seen fit to offer a defence for their refusal to re-seat the six Imams. You seem pretty keen on inventing one for them, but I think their silence speaks volumes as it is.
And how many news stories have you read lately that included that amount of coverage?
How many of those men were priests, or rabbis, or ministers? Do you think that there might be a different level of credibility between dime-store grifters and a half-dozen national representatives of the second largest faith in the world?
A grain of salt? More like a salt mine. Your zeal in inventing possible scenarios that paint the Imams as conniving tricksters out to make the airline look bad is remarkable. It’s unfortunate that the lack of evidence you have to support these theories is only matched by their lack of relevance to the complaint. Because, again, even if the Imams deliberatly provoked the airlines into acting like this, it does not excuse the airlines willingness to rise to the provocation.
Likewise for yourself. I’m sure the defense attorney would love to have you in the jury, though. He wouldn’t have to say a thing, you’re clearly more than happy to invent defenses for his clients all by yourself, and who cares if there’s any evidence to support it?
It is not when you use reports from sites defending racial profiling and bigotry.
It could be because our points have better confirmation than the “non-defense” of airline, possibilities and ideas of yours. Besides, I can not speak for others here but the solutions I think do not depend on assuming the airline was prejudiced.
My first responses were based only on the original link which was pretty limited. Since then I’ve read a dozen or more and the variance in the details only leads me to conclude that we shouldn’t accept them as absolute.
The questions that remain unanswered for me, are
1 Did the Imams do anything out of the ordinary in hopes of provoking some response? In answering that I’d like to hear from other passengers and crew members. I’ve heard the Imams side but not the other.
2 What are US air policies concerning this? Specifically, once the initial note was passed does policy dictate that they have to look into it?
If thats the case I don’t see that as bigotry but an execution of policy that they couldn’t avoid.
Who made the decision to ask them to leave the plane? The pilot?
Did they peacefully cooperate or refuse?
Of course they have a right to refuse and might be called morally correct for doing so but it certainly escalates the situation when an official is trying to do the unpleasant portion of their job and run into resistance rather than cooperation.
Was the flight delayed for several hours after they left the plane?
Why did US air choose not to fly them at all? Who made that call? Was it policy? Racism? Just anger from a shitty situation?
7 Did the Imams lie or exaggerate to be more effective victims?
If anyone has any definite answers on any of these I’d love to hear them.
I see. You can’t.
They practiced their religion where they happened to be. It’s perfectly ordinary to practice one’s religion. I’m kind of fond of practicing mine where I happen to be.
You’re either very thick or you’re dangerously close to trolling. The initial note, as you have already been made aware, was simply complaining about a group of people uttering the Arabic word for God.
If the airline has a policy that specifically states that Muslims must be denied service, than that policy is illegal. Such a policy would be bigotry.
Read the report again. You will find the answer.
Had they resisted with violence, do you really think such a thing would have escaped the news?
That’s irrelevant. The individuals denied service based on their practicing their religion were delayed and further inconvenienced.
The simplest answer works very well sometimes: Bigotry.
What is their motivation to lie? What is their motivation to become a victim?
I doubt that. Above I said you’re dangerously close to trolling. I was mistaken. You are a troll in this thread.
I agree Monty, except on the bit of Bigotry. Incompetency or fear can explain it also. Even though this guy wants to claim it is shitty logic, it is clear that even considering all excuses it is silly to deny there is no solution or things to do to prevent this from happening again.
I have recognized that as a problem but I’m pretty sure nobody has that policy.
I’m also pretty sure you know that. Do you suppose Muslim and people who look Middle eastern fly on US air every fucking day without problems or is it their habit to ask any male who looks Arab to exit the plane?
Lets be realistic. Given the facts of recent history and the very real and serious problems facing the world, many made worse by our dick head of a president, do you think it’s unreasonable for anyone to be more suspicious or cautious concerning Arab males than say Chinese males or Caucasian males? Of course as a group of Arab males their actions got a little more attention.
In this case what I might call intentionally provocative or unwise, is a group of Arab males criticizing US Arab policies out loud in a boarding area. Do they have that right? Of course? Is it smart? No. I’m also unfamiliar with Muslim prayers. How loud were they and what is the requirement of their religion? Others are in the post where I listed some questions.
Really? If I subtly provoke an argument or confrontation is it inappropriate for an argument to take place? If it does am I blameless?
When I hear more from the other side.
It may indeed be unlikely. I haven’t been promoting anything else as *more *probable. I just stated I thought other scenarios are at least possible and the rest of this crap followed.
I grant you that we don’t have any evidence that the Imams are lying. That is in part because they are doing most of the talking.
Who gets to decide that. You? You don’t know what happened after the note we have a picture of. You don’t know airline policy or who said what to who. Still you feel free to cast judgment based on very limited evidence. Isn’t that what you’re pissed at the airline for?
And I have agreed several times. I’d like to know if the flight was delayed several hours and if the other passengers were screened again. If thats true that would indicate to me that the airline was trying to follow policy and might have had the intention of allowing them to re board. As I said, once things get out of hand shit happens out of anger and resentment. Calling it base bigotry doesn’t make it so. In fact, if you’re mistaken you are now adding to the problem by casting judgment without knowing the whole story.
Okay, I meant a separate issue from them being asked to leave the plane which it seems you agree the airline had to do.
My point is we don’t know how all that went down after they left the plane. Perhaps the airlines silence indicates guilt but I think that is a premature judgment.
I repeat. The issue of illegal activities was determined by some authorities including the FBI. Nothing illegal was found. That doesn’t compel the airline to grant them a seat. On that issue we haven’t heard their side of it.
You can think that and I can disagree. As I’ve said before, major cooperations sometimes have a no comment policy regardless of whether they are right, partially right, or completely wrong.
As I said repeatedly. I’m not trying to defend or condemn anyone. I’m simply expressing myself about limited evidence.
If it comes to a lawsuit we may get more details or not. It’s numbers for the airline. If they think it’s cheaper to settle they will, even if they did nothing wrong. They know you might be on the jury.
None. Your point? I think this is a very serious and dangerous issue for all concerned. I’d rather see this explored than many of the stories that make the national news. Thats not my call.
You’re right. I guess Pat Robertson really did break the weight lifting record because of his protein shake. Integrity doesn’t involve a title.
My feeling was that everybody seemed to be gleefully condemning the airline as bigots based on very little conclusive evidence. I recognized that although they might be correct it wasn’t the only possibility given the limited evidence. I based that on conflicting details and personnel experience. My only zeal has been to defend that position. Not the airline.
concerning the bolded bit. Thats a ridiculous statement and sad if you really believe that. You admitted that they had to react to the note and that was not bigotry. Yet the Imams called it that, blaming the airline rather than a paranoid passenger.
How do you feel about Jesse Jackson? Has he used racism as a tool to promote himself? Of course he has actually helped plenty of people so does that justify all his actions or negate his dishonest methods and motives?
I’m not accusing the Imams of anything. I’m only saying that statement you made seems ludicrous to me.
and bullshit
what I’m saying is not guilty because of insufficient evidence. It has nothing to do with my inventing defenses.
If I were to judge in a civil trial which requires only more likely than not, and the airline refused to defend themselves, I would say the Imams win.
Over and over people have said well this clearly indicates this and this must indicate this. What I’m saying is while those things are possible, I don’t see them as certain. That seems to bother some folks and I’m not sure why.