3 ms·

It's not clear to me why having cards that say bomb is at all relevant. What's the thinking here, that any terrorist needs to be able to say "bomb" in Arabic to

by lutorm 17y ago

It's not clear to me why having cards that say bomb is at all relevant. What's the thinking here, that any terrorist needs to be able to say "bomb" in Arabic to make it go off? For a country that allows people to say that they support the Holocaust in the name of free speech, this seems COMPLETELY misguided. Not just a little, but completely. I'd bet that there is zero correlation between being able to say bomb in Arabic, or between wanting to learn to say bomb in Arabic, and wanting to set one off.

gojomo 17y ago
My point is: presentation matters. One side of a flashcard is a label. Holding the 'bomb' label against one's laptop, and the 'terrorist' label against one's chest like a nametag is a different presentation -- one designed to provoke thought or even alarm -- as opposed to just having the cards among others inside a carry-on. Similarly, what if he ostentatiously dropped just the terror-related cards while in the security line? If the truth is close to those scenarios, then Nicholas George wanted attention, and he got it. It's harder for me to get worked up about TSA if that's the case.
- sailormoon 17y ago
  Did you even read the article? He had a stack of common flash cards in his pocket. He needed to know words like "bomb" and "terrorism" to understand arabic newspapers. Nothing about holding the card for "terrorist" against his chest or ostentatiously dropping the cards in front of the guards.
  - gojomo 17y ago
    I read the article very carefully. Did you? It did not give any indication of how 'common' the cards were, or whether there was a 'stack' or just a few. You are sympathetically imagining those details. Did you read what I wrote carefully? I said the interpretation depends on details not available in the story, and my scenarios were hypotheticals to reflect how much was left out of the LATimes account. We don't know how the cards were noticed. I've gone through security often, and sometimes had 'extra attention', but they've never lingered over the contents of my pockets or carry-on enough to read the titles of my books, or writing on my note cards. Yet, for Mr. George, 2 flashcards (of an unknown number, perhaps just 2) that were "in his pocket" were (a) touchy words for the TSA; (b) somehow observed by them. It makes a difference whether they were in the middle of a deep deck in his carry-on, or he fished exactly those two out of his pocket and dropped them into the x-ray tray. One is perfectly innocent; the other suggests he was trying to test the limits or provoke a reaction. I don't know what actually happened and unless you've read a more detailed source than the LATimes article, neither do you.

by lutorm 17y ago

gojomo 17y ago

My point is: presentation matters. One side of a flashcard is a label. Holding the 'bomb' label against one's laptop, and the 'terrorist' label against one's chest like a nametag is a different presentation -- one designed to provoke thought or even alarm -- as opposed to just having the cards among others inside a carry-on. Similarly, what if he ostentatiously dropped just the terror-related cards while in the security line? If the truth is close to those scenarios, then Nicholas George wanted attention, and he got it. It's harder for me to get worked up about TSA if that's the case.

sailormoon 17y ago
Did you even read the article? He had a stack of common flash cards in his pocket. He needed to know words like "bomb" and "terrorism" to understand arabic newspapers. Nothing about holding the card for "terrorist" against his chest or ostentatiously dropping the cards in front of the guards.
- gojomo 17y ago
  I read the article very carefully. Did you? It did not give any indication of how 'common' the cards were, or whether there was a 'stack' or just a few. You are sympathetically imagining those details. Did you read what I wrote carefully? I said the interpretation depends on details not available in the story, and my scenarios were hypotheticals to reflect how much was left out of the LATimes account. We don't know how the cards were noticed. I've gone through security often, and sometimes had 'extra attention', but they've never lingered over the contents of my pockets or carry-on enough to read the titles of my books, or writing on my note cards. Yet, for Mr. George, 2 flashcards (of an unknown number, perhaps just 2) that were "in his pocket" were (a) touchy words for the TSA; (b) somehow observed by them. It makes a difference whether they were in the middle of a deep deck in his carry-on, or he fished exactly those two out of his pocket and dropped them into the x-ray tray. One is perfectly innocent; the other suggests he was trying to test the limits or provoke a reaction. I don't know what actually happened and unless you've read a more detailed source than the LATimes article, neither do you.