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If after a terrorist attack, it emerged that the attacker had recently returned from Afghanistan to have a friendly chat with security officers about his Osama

If after a terrorist attack, it emerged that the attacker had recently returned from Afghanistan to have a friendly chat with security officers about his Osama Bin Laden candy box, his book on Mohammed, the live round in his pocket and the notes in his diary about how to renounce citizenship everyone would be appalled. This is an interesting article but the fact that the author is in any way surprised by what happened to him is astonishing. Whilst it would be nice to live in a world where this wasn't necessary we don't and I'm reassured that the security response was what it was.

djacobs 16y ago
I'm not. The raw emotion controlling the interrogating 'official' is not reassuring to me at all. Also, "live round"? Really?
- petenixey 16y ago
  I used the term "live round" rather than "bullet" in deference to the other comments on the page. The emotion is unfortunately part of the process. An interrogation is designed to unsettle someone, it's not a process of uncovering evidence, an audit; it requires shaking the fruit down from the tree. Had he been interrogated in such a manner for simply being muslim or Afghani I would have been saddened but in the context these questions were apparently merited. Either you bring paraphernalia associated with terrorism and accept the consequences or you leave them behind. Expecting to bring those things back from Afghanistan and just walk through is ridiculous.
  - davidcuddeback 16y ago
    > Expecting to bring those things back from Afghanistan and just walk through is ridiculous. My reading of the story has the CBP agent pulling him aside solely on the fact that he visited Afghanistan and Pakistan. They did not uncover the other items until they thoroughly searched his pack while already in the interrogation room. Edited to add (from the story): "Once inside the room, the Officer began to inspect the contents of my backpack."
  - djacobs 16y ago
    Emotion is not appropriate, regardless of what they claim their "rationale" is. Clearly they weren't using reasoning here, so I don't think the emotion was planned or well-intentioned. The questions were not merited at all, from my reading of it. Candy, bullet without a gun, a musing about US citizenship. Nope, no merit.
jemfinch 16y ago
I don't think there's anything surprising about the author being detained. I don't think there's anything unreasonable about it. It's the manner in which the interrogation was conducted that was the problem. Yelling in his face? Asking him what his religious beliefs are? Are they detaining him while they conduct an investigation, or are they going to arrest him for being Muslim? What you don't hear about after a terrorist attack is how the attacker's innocent mother/brother/sister/friend/cousin was interrogated in exactly this way by a customs agent, and that's what started that terrorist down the path of violence. No one ever has a chance to be appalled at the aftereffects of interrogations such as these.

djacobs 16y ago

I'm not. The raw emotion controlling the interrogating 'official' is not reassuring to me at all. Also, "live round"? Really?

petenixey 16y ago
I used the term "live round" rather than "bullet" in deference to the other comments on the page. The emotion is unfortunately part of the process. An interrogation is designed to unsettle someone, it's not a process of uncovering evidence, an audit; it requires shaking the fruit down from the tree. Had he been interrogated in such a manner for simply being muslim or Afghani I would have been saddened but in the context these questions were apparently merited. Either you bring paraphernalia associated with terrorism and accept the consequences or you leave them behind. Expecting to bring those things back from Afghanistan and just walk through is ridiculous.
- davidcuddeback 16y ago
  > Expecting to bring those things back from Afghanistan and just walk through is ridiculous. My reading of the story has the CBP agent pulling him aside solely on the fact that he visited Afghanistan and Pakistan. They did not uncover the other items until they thoroughly searched his pack while already in the interrogation room. Edited to add (from the story): "Once inside the room, the Officer began to inspect the contents of my backpack."
- djacobs 16y ago
  Emotion is not appropriate, regardless of what they claim their "rationale" is. Clearly they weren't using reasoning here, so I don't think the emotion was planned or well-intentioned. The questions were not merited at all, from my reading of it. Candy, bullet without a gun, a musing about US citizenship. Nope, no merit.

jemfinch 16y ago

I don't think there's anything surprising about the author being detained. I don't think there's anything unreasonable about it. It's the manner in which the interrogation was conducted that was the problem. Yelling in his face? Asking him what his religious beliefs are? Are they detaining him while they conduct an investigation, or are they going to arrest him for being Muslim? What you don't hear about after a terrorist attack is how the attacker's innocent mother/brother/sister/friend/cousin was interrogated in exactly this way by a customs agent, and that's what started that terrorist down the path of violence. No one ever has a chance to be appalled at the aftereffects of interrogations such as these.