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UC Berkeley student questioned, refused service after speaking Arabic on flight
- Will_Do 10y agoPretty interesting story. Not sure if anyone did anything wrong other than mishearing. A passenger thinks she hears someone sign off of a conversation with "martyr" and reports it. Given that information he's thrown off the plane which is also reasonable. The guy who got kicked off also did nothing wrong. He was just talking to his uncle. I suspect the same thing would happen to anyone regardless of race or nationality should the words Allah and martyr be uttered in close succession on a plane.
- JamilD 10y ago"Shahid", the Arabic word for martyr, is a common first name. Saying that name in certain contexts might be cause for suspicion, but certainly not denying someone boarding.
- yifanlu 10y agoNo. Let's see what happens if this same story is told without the racism. Bob is on the phone with his mother and said he will have a "salad" tonight. Sally across the aisle heard it as "suicide" and reports him. The attendant promptly calls security, has him evicted, and the FBI is called. Does that sound reasonable to you? So no. Many people did lots of things wrong that day. The passenger who obviously doesn't know arabic mishears a word and reports him out of prejudice. The staff who took the complaint seriously because of his race. The security and FBI who harassed him for a long time as a result. Do you really think a white man uttering Allah (where that's the only word heard by another passenger) would be subjected to the same treatment? And also, even if the man WAS a terrorist, do you really think he would go on the phone and talk about his terrorist plots in the open? Even if this guy said "martyr", that still does not warrant the treatment he received. Just like if Bob actually said "suicide," literally it's just a word that's sometimes used in a bad context. He wasn't misheard as saying "I will blow up this plane." So it took many layers of prejudice for this to happen.
- vixen99 10y agoEasy to rationalize after the event. Perforce because of our partial knowledge, we use prejudice (and faulty logic in the heat of the moment) everyday. It's also known as pre-judgement and it often gets things wrong. I don't know anybody these days who doesn't look round at his or her fellow-passengers on a flight, and wonder.
- ZanyProgrammer 10y agoI don't-no one has successfully hijacked an American airliner after 9/11. The odds of it happening probably aren't that great.
- mindslight 10y agoDiscerning motivations and monday morning quarterbacking whether they were justified or not is a quagmire of futility. Really, the victim just needs to be made whole - force these organizations to stop creating externalities out of their self-created costs. To me, it sounds like the victim in this case is owed an automatic payment of at least several thousand dollars for the lost day, emotional distress, etc. The civil damages in a general kidnapping/wrongful imprisonment case are also a good reference point. He really should sue - free apologies don't reform bad incentives. Southwest should have also removed the reporting woman from the plane so the victim could face his accuser, and also to reduce frivolous complaints. If she really thinks he was a t'rist, she should be wanting to get off that plane regardless.
- yazaddaruvala 10y agoI think this is reasonable deterrence. The accuser should be asked to get off the plane, and remain with the authorities, till such a time as the accused is allowed to leave or is taken into custody.
- im3w1l 10y agoYou are responding as if the reporting woman could have, should have, expected this outcome. For all she knew, the report could have just resulted in an extra-thorough search.
- ZanyProgrammer 10y agoHow about instead of 'thinking' she heard something sounding like martyr, she dons but more research?
- azernik 10y agoExcept that, in Arabic, "Allah" is just how you say "God". And the number of standard set phrases that include the word ("inshallah" (God willing), "al-hamdu lillah" (praise the Lord!), "bismillah" (by God), "wallahi" (oh God, wow), etc.) are enormous. So a ban on saying the word "Allah" is basically a ban on speaking any normal variant of Arabic.
- smnrchrds 10y agoAlso these words are often used for their idiomatic meaning: "inshallah" (God willing): Hopefully "al-hamdu lillah" (praise the Lord!): Fortunately "wallah" (oh God, wow): I swear, I promise etc.
- khnd 10y agocan't tell if you're trolling.
- drallison 10y agoOutrageous and disturbing behavior on the part of Southwest Airlines and the security people. As is too often the case, the details of what transpired are lost, but this sort of incident shows how irrational fears are now driving institutional behavior.
- bkovacev 10y agoThis definitely was outrageous - but fear was not the driving force of the institutional behavior - it was the reasonable doubt.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 10y agoI read the article and I didn't see any "reasonable" doubt there.
- bkovacev 10y agoSo as a security officer when someone says there might be a bomb - you would not react? That's reasonable?
- bunderbunder 10y agoThe security officer should ask for reason to believe there's a bomb that's a little bit more substantive than, "Dude was speaking a language I don't understand." Otherwise we're at great risk of crossing the line from authority-as-protector-of-the-public to authority-as-weapon-the-public-can-use-against-each-other. See also: swatting.
- ben_jones 10y agoYou take a bunch of low payed people with below average education levels and throw them into a bueracratic system where there only goal is not to get fired and this is what you get. I just hope people blame management as much as they blame the individual workers because in all honestly it's not the individuals who are make these actions.
- bkovacev 10y agoWhile I agree that this was really harsh and inhumane - you have to understand that this is a normal behavior of the security officers. What if the guy was actually a terrorist? Would you praise that woman because she was the one alarming the police? Instead of judging the woman, put yourself in her position - she panicked and reacted, if you had a child near you - would you have done the same? Don't generalize too early - this is an isolated case.
- JamilD 10y agoI always hear "this is an isolated case" when events like this come up. Truth is, it's not just an isolated incident. Similar events have happened multiple times on Southwest Airlines alone. Here's a Guardian article from November 2015 detailing some other cases: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/21/southwest-airlines-muslim-middle-eastern-passengers http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/21/southwest-air...
- threwbacca 10y agoIf we're going to speculate, let's go ahead and flip the hypothetical. So you're on the plane with your kid, and a passenger freaks out because they overheard a scrap of a conversation in a language they don't speak. Security takes that very seriously, so of course they get everyone off the plane. You, along with every other passenger, are separately questioned about your activities, politics, and religious beliefs. Your carry on and checked luggage are both searched carefully. Your kid is interrogated to make sure that you're not lying about being their guardian, and that your stories add up. Of course, they find nothing. There are no terrorists on the plane (although a couple of teenagers are arrested for failing a breathalyzer test). But out of an abundance of caution, the airline elects to cancel the flight, and bar you all from further travel with them for 24 hours. You're refunded your original ticket price, of course, with no hard feelings! Does that still seem like a reasonable response to you? Or is it only when you're not subject to it that draconian security measures are an appropriate way to deal with a ludicrous imagined threat?
- bkovacev 10y agoTo be fair - it does. Nowadays, you never know when someone will blow up. Take for instance the Turkey bombing. Guy causally walked on the street and suddenly detonated himself killing a dozen of people. I'm Serbian and I do not have a green card. I speak "buga, buga" language as my team mates call it. I look bulky since I do sports and weight lifting plus I have a shaved head and I have a beard. Typical criminal type looking. For the past six years I have been on an F-1 visa. Numerous times was my passport taken longer to "process", my I-20 and my emails taken longer to read. I was 10 finger printed every time, you know, just in case. I had to retake photos all the time. I am still looked down upon because my passport is not from the EU, but I'm European. People do not hear my accent. Once my I-20 was not signed by my school - I was taken to a separate room - interrogated for 45 minutes and then they finally called the school and the school verified. Once I took my shaker bottle and my protein with me in a carry on. I was moved aside to a separate room, interrogated for 20 minutes as they were running some kind of tests to the powder. In London I was denied a visa for a 24 hour stay, when British Airways was on strike so I have spent the Christmas Eve with a security officer at the airport. Have I ever called that racism/nationalism or whatever? No, not really. Police are there to protect you and are there to protect your interest. 9/10 times the police is wrong, but what about that 1/10 times when they're right? People just assume that cops will figure it out - they still have to do their jobs. EDIT: For the people that forgot - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_bombing_of_Yugoslavia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_bombing_of_Yugoslavia PS Oh man the downvotes, gotta love HN.
- bunderbunder 10y agoHow about if airlines instead offer a refund or voucher to scared white people who are afraid to share a flight with a brown person and decide to get off the plane?
- mc32 10y agoHow do you know this passenger was "brown". ME people come in many shades. Muslims come in pretty much all shades. What if he were Albanian and kicked off, would that have been okay? It's not always white vs other. You can find this kind if fear in India (where you have violent clashes pretty frequently). Are you saying somehow Americans are better than other people and somehow therefore should be other than human? I know we should all strive to be better people. Looking at things along stark racial lines is not always helpful. Treating a subgroup of people as the Other is not particularly a "white" thing. It happens to all people --travel a bit. We should expect more from all people.
- bunderbunder 10y agoI know he's brown because it says so right there in the article. 'Brown' is a catch-all term that folks of many ethnicities, including Middle Eastern ones, use to describe themselves. And the existence of racism on the other side of the planet does not somehow diminish or excuse or modulate how racism occurs in the USA.
- mc32 10y agoThere are people in India who are essentially the same "race" who do violence and injustice to each other, so it's not entirely clear to me "racism" is what causes people to act biased. That is my point. People are quick to attribute many ills to race but we see the same thing intra-racially, so there would appear to be other causes. That's not saying racism does not exist. It does, but I don't know this is attributable to it.
- jeremysmyth 10y agoAll too often, the scared white person is wearing the airline's uniform.
- awinter-py 10y agoMan am I lucky to be a twerpy white guy (some days). When I travel I opt out of the scanner every time, ask the pat-down guy what happens if he finds drugs on me, and sometimes refuse the search by asking them if I'm under arrest ('if not, am I free to go?'). If the TSA agent won't let me leave without a search, I demand they call the cops, who are obligated to let me leave (not enter the airport, though) because I haven't committed a crime. One time in SFO they called the bomb squad because I tested positive for fertilizer (or something) and I still went through all this. I refused something called a 'private room crotch rub', which I regret a little. When I talk to friends who are any shade of brown they tell me 'you should have had your ass handed to you'.
- ctvo 10y agoYou're THAT guy. You go out of your way to be a dick to people doing their jobs because you feel the need to prove some point in the most obtuse way.
- derrickdirge 10y agoIf their job is to invade my privacy and restrict my liberty then I don't feel obligated to be polite to them. I'm not sure if that makes me a bad person, but I'm certain that the Nazis were all just doing their jobs.
- beeboop 10y agoThe TSA isn't violating your privacy or liberty. You have the option to not fly, or to charter your own aircraft if you don't want to be subjected to TSA. Your anger is misplaced. Maybe direct it at your representatives, or your fellow voters for doing such a poor job at electing representatives.
- awinter-py 10y agoYou may have a point, but I don't know how else to act. I live in a community where 30% of respondents oppose flag burning, 20% support the right to do it, and the other half will agree with either side depending on how the question is framed. So 'patriotism' is a mixed up concept with two sides. In my case, I oppose the forces of chaos by making a fuss about search without probable cause. I recognize the social cost of acting this way, but it's not in my personality to blindly consent.
- spriggan3 10y agoOutrage bait. I'd be careful with these kind of articles where the truth is always more or less obfuscated in order to generate clicks.
- fabulist 10y agoYour advice is sage, but regardless of the reality behind this particular story, it is undeniable that there is a problem in the United States with people being hateful. There is definitely anti-Muslim sentiment. There is definitely anti-LGBTQ sentiment. I don't think it's a coincidence; we're fostering a culture of hate and fear.
- minimaximus 10y agoNice latent bigotry you've got there. You're implying that the bigoted passenger's suspicions 'might have been justified' and we're only hearing one side of the story. If there was any merit to the other side (which clearly there isn't) then this guy wouldn't have been allowed to leave freely after being publicly humiliated to appease the beast of the security apparatus. I'm amazed how bigotry against Muslims and Arabs has become so 'accepted' in today's America. My 6 year old kids get called terrorists at school and nobody bats an eye. Imagine if Black or Jewish or Asian kids were called bigoted adjectives at schools, there would be a public outcry, but it's ok, they're just A-rabs, and people, including the potential next president, are playing that dirty game. It's sickening and it's simply emotional terrorism.
- spriggan3 10y ago> Nice latent bigotry you've got there. Nice social justice warfare you've got here, accusing me of bigotry for not believing the usual journalistic gospel blindly. I'm certainly implying that reporters often don't tell their audience all the facts to push a specific narrative. Were you in the plane ? me neither so I'm skeptical and just choose not to blindly follow the "muslim thrown out of a plane because muh islamophobia" narrative. The article is one sided, that's not news that activism. If i'm a bigot then you're the most gullible person on this planet.
- gozur88 10y ago
- SherlockeHolmes 10y agoThe fact that some of us here mentioned "reasonable doubt" explains the shortcomings we currently have in depth of analysis beyond anything superficial. Our justifications sound like this - "while we murdered them in millions earlier, and now we murder them in thousands - we reserve the right to interrogate, disservice, and harass any of them on our soil should they speak the wrong way". If we are true Americans, we'd say this instead - "I believe in their right to liberty as much as ours. I will not be afraid because someone is speaking Arabic, or because someone's skin in brown, or because someone's face is bearded. I share the dangerous climate on our planet with my Muslim brothers, and I will take on the risks without stooping to bigotry. I will walk the straight path, and I will uphold the fundamentals of the very constitution our nation is built upon. We will fight terrorism together, for I understand it is a disease that has roots in no religion but in apathy." Edit: omit "sickening". changed "you" to "we". Changed "three people" to "some of us"
- nothrabannosir 10y ago> ...true Americans... Careful with that; it's the no true scotsman fallacy. The sad thing is that these people are, in fact, True Americans.
- dietrichepp 10y agoHere it's used as a rhetorical device, "true Americans" is an appeal to our sense of national identity. Be careful identifying fallacies by the superficial qualities they have, pay attention to the context where phrases are used.
- gtremper 10y agoIsn't "no true Scotsman" an appeal to national identity?
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- nsajko 10y agoDid the SA employees even have authority to remove him from the plane without the police?
- maxerickson 10y agoThey assert a lot of control over their aircraft. Page 15: https://www.southwest.com/assets/pdfs/corporate-commitments/contract-of-carriage.pdf https://www.southwest.com/assets/pdfs/corporate-commitments/... Which of course doesn't mean those assertions are legally valid, but that's the contract.
- daodedickinson 10y agoSo he's on a UC Berkeley debate team? From my experience, that's not as hateful an anti-American group as the San Francisco State debate team, or the Towson debate team, or the Binghampton or Bard debate team, but pretty close. I can see why the UC paper would think that makes the airlines look worse, but pro-genocide arguments like the following are quite normal and accepted at these kind of debate programs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RC-Cqkq6zWc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RC-Cqkq6zWc
- whatev5 10y ago> As is too often the case, the details of what transpired are lost And yet you hold a strong opinion on the basis of nothing. You self righteous naive children ought to have your irony detectors fixed.
- dang 10y ago>You self righteous naive children ought to have your irony detectors fixed. We ban accounts that comment like this on HN, so please don't comment like this. Instead (re-)read the guidelines and post civilly and substantively, or not at all. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html (We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11515503 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11515503 and marked it off-topic.)
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- ctvo 10y agoWhat would the expectation be for the airline in this case? Ignore the report? Delay the flight for everyone else as they gather more information?
- T2_t2 10y agoThey could solve this issue in three minutes: if you make an accusation the you have to miss the flight as well. If accusation also have a cost, people won;t make them for rather flimsy reasons.
- Kyrvin 10y ago"EDIT: For the people that forgot - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_bombing_of_Yugoslavia" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_bombing_of_Yugoslavia" What the fuck does the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia have to do with a Muslim student having his human rights violated? "I'm Serbian" you said, and you're bitching because ~1000 civilians were killed in a some bombings. Did you forget the genocide that the Serbians committed not 4 years prior? You don't EVER get to bitch about your people getting killed in that operation, especially considering the state organized oppression Yugoslavia was subjecting the people of Kosovo to. Go fuck yourself, and shove your pity mongering up your ass where it belongs.
- bkovacev 10y agoGreat comment it really adds to the discussion! It has to do everything with it. Since, you're so ignorant and rude let me explain it to you like you are five, since I believe that is your age. If a certain country bombards your country you have the right to hold a grudge against it, especially if someone closed to you died in "some bombing". If I wanted to be a dick about how the whole world, and especially how the US hates me I'd use that argument and say that's all because you bombarded us and you hate us. bla bla. Instead I chose to get my diploma in the US. Starting to make a connection? No one even started the politics or who was right or who was wrong - but you obviously do hold some grudge. It was about human lives. If you really want to know - I thought that was a bad call, but why should you care, you just said go f. yourself out of the blue. You're still living in a cave - might want to try and get a real life education Patrick. Good job on being absolutely biased with no real opinion and experience about the situation :) If you want to go to the politics. What happened to the Serbian children that were shot to death while they were swimming in a lake that started the whole incident? What about the organs that were farmed by your so called "Kosovo people." Now on the point of "some bombing" - what you have just stated shows how much you appreciate a human life. Well, also, since you're spoon fed the news by all the lobbied news station keep living in your ignorance. Cheers. What a happy life you must live.Try and see a therapist - hopefully he'll be able to help you with your problems.
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- rainhacker 10y agoI always wear my university branded apparel when travelling by air, hopefully, to avoid being stereotyped in wrong way based on the color of my skin.