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October 1,
2001
Race-Baiting at
the Washington Post
Refuting Michael Kinsley
By Hizam Bitar
This time Michael Kinsley goes for the
jugular (When
Is Racial Profiling Okay, September 30). He proposes for
America to stick to an old but abhorrent tradition of compromising
civil liberties when national security is threatened regardless
of the demonstrated lack of utility of such a tradition. His
numerous arguments in support of racial profiling of Arabs appeal
to many things except to commonsense despite his effort to pepper
his analysis with objective sounding words such as "statistical"
(5 times) and "rational" (6 times).
But let's assume Kinsley is
on to something here.
Before we start let's see if
we can define who is an "Arab-looking man." Since there
is no legal or scientific definition, Kinsley could be referring
to common stereotypes such as a hooked nose, swarthy complexion,
facial hair, and other physically unattractive attributes by
Western standards. It's the images of Arabs most Americans have
been conditioned by Hollywood to hate and to look out for. This
stereotype excludes fair-looking Arabs from many Mediterranean
regions as well as Black Arabs from African countries such as
Sudan, Somal, and Mauritania. This exclusion leaves out a pretty
sizable chunk of Arabs.
Then there are Christian Arabs
who account for over 50% of Arab Americans. No Christian Arab
has been involved in the hijacking of airplanes in recent memory.
If we are to exclude them from the profile what system will we
use to identify someone's religion? Will airport security ask
a passenger about his religion? Or will it be based on the person's
name. What if a person legally changes his names from Ali to
Al? Or what if they refuse to acknowledge their religion of birth
when asked? Will they be prosecuted for lying or will the Federal
government enforce a caste system by which Muslim Arabs will
be issued a special social security number that will trigger
certain flags at security checkpoints. How about federally mandated
green armbands for all Arab-men in US airports?
From past experience with airport
profiling systems already in place, even Hispanics and South
Asians have been flagged because they fit some aspects of the
Arab racial profile.
Should ethnic groups who share
some of the stereotypes with Arabs go along with racial profiling
for the sake of God and Country? Should those people of color
not mind the "intrusive inspection" since their reward
too is that "they don't want to be hijacked and blown up
either" while other fellow Americans move about unimpeded.
Kinsley casts a wide but malformed
net in his effort to promote racial profiling but he offers no
answers to the many problematic questions despite his allegedly
rational arguments and statistical calculations.
Kinsley bravely admits the
"likelihood is infinitesimal" that an Arab-looking
man would hijack a commercial jetliner. Yet he has no issue with
holding a whole ethnic group hostage to a system that has guilt
by association at its core. This is collective punishment regardless
of the articulated aims and concerns. And for how long should
Arab-looking men have to suffer this indignity? Will there be
a probation period for Arab-looking men after which the collective
punishment will end?
The other problem with racial
profiling is that it is never limited to airports. Arab-looking
men who drive vans and trucks will be profiled as well as Arabs
who access the Internet from public libraries; and those who
buy fertilizers at The Home Depot for their backyards. As for
Arab-looking men who decide to take flying lessons, they should
forget about it.
If all Arab-looking men should
be profiled because of an "infinitesimal" chance a
few may cause grave harm, what stops Kinsley from going after
Hispanics or Russians too? Or even people infected with the AIDS
virus.
Think of the impact Kinsley's
racial profiling system could have on the war against illicit
drugs. Profile every Hispanic and Russian crossing US borders
and there could be a major reduction in drug trafficking and
drug related crimes. True it's an insignificant minority of Hispanics
and Russians who are engaged in the drug trade, but according
to Kinsley such profiling is an acceptable price for the thousands
of lives that could be spared every year from drug related crimes
and ailments. The lives saved could eclipse those lost in the
September 11 terror attack. That should fit nicely within Kinsley's
rational statistical analysis and meet his criteria for acceptable
non-racist discrimination.
Kinsley might as well demand
the profiling of people infected with the AIDS virus by subjecting
all Gay-looking men (let Hollywood determine the profile) to
blood tests. After all, the AIDS epidemic has killed millions
to date. It's estimated millions more will die from this deadly
disease. The potential for saving human lives, not just by the
thousands, but also by the millions, should fill Kinsley with
delight at the prospects.
But is saving lives what purely
motivates Kinsley? The overwhelming majority of victims of drug
abuse and drug-related crimes as well as AIDS are not predominantly
from America's middle and upper class.
So after calculating political
and economic costs and benefits, and engaging in moral acrobatics,
even the most controversial security policies will sound reasonable
given the appropriate circumstances. It seems when it comes to
Arabs, Kinsley found little political price to be paid. His timing
couldn't have been any better to advance his agenda.
Before he wraps up his column,
Kinsley reinforces his flank since it's inevitable for people
of color in the US who have been hurt in the past by racial stereotyping
to object to his call for racial profiling and to come to the
rescue of Arab-Americans. "Racial profiling and affirmative
action are analytically the same thing" he argues. For political
expediency, Kinsley waves his magic wand and transforms affirmative
action into another form of acceptable discrimination. His message
is simple: if you wish to end one form of discrimination against
Arabs, you may have to end discrimination in the form of affirmative
action. So attention people of color, take your affirmative action
and run with it. Leave the Arabs to Kinsley.
If we think Kinsley's call
for rational discrimination stops at airport security, think
again. What sent chills through my spine is Kinsley's assertion
that when counter terrorism squads storm "a plane looking
for the person who has planted a bomb somewhere, there isn't
time to avoid valid generalizations and treat each person as
an individual." There is so much callousness in Kinsley's
point which clearly suggests that Arab-looking hostages on a
hijacked airplane can be taken out in the heat of the moment.
In the end, Kinsley decides
that the price of racial profiling is "pretty small"
and it's a matter of "inconvenience and embarrassment."
I wonder if Kinsley is capable of imagining how terribly cruel
it would be for a young Arab American to be subjected to the
special treatment in front of his peers and to grow up with the
stigma of being the usual suspect and a national security threat
to his own country. May be Kinsley will offer Arab-American parents
some advice on what they should tell their children when they
are the only ones being stopped for "intrusive inspections"
while others who don 't look like them are not. Should they tell
them that in America guilt by association is legitimate, rational,
and statistically sound?
This is not the first time
we read of Michael Kinsley's opinions about Arabs. At the start
of the Palestinian Intifada last year it was Kinsley who described
the Arab youth who captured and executed two undercover Israeli
soldiers (not innocent civilians) in the Palestinian city of
Ramallah as "a piece of shit posing as a human being"
and called other Arabs nearby "turds." Such statements
hardly rise to the level of professional journalism. Yet in the
days before and after this bloody incident, Israeli soldiers
shot and killed dozens of unarmed Arab civilians many of whom
were children bystanders. Kinsley for some reason had no strong
views on the subject of the killing of innocent Arab civilians
by Western Israelis. That's the same Michael Kinsley who does
not believe extra frequent flyer miles are necessary as token
reparation for the proposed institutional discrimination against
Arab-Americans.
What's an alternative solution
to Kinsley's racial profiling system?
At the entrances of many stadiums
in the US, every person is searched regardless of race, gender,
religion, sexual orientation, national origin, etc. No racial
profiling system is used and none is needed. This system might
be less cost-effective and the lines will tend to be long. But
with more security personnel, the lines can be shortened. This
system is fair to all. There is beauty in simplicity.
We spend hundreds of billions
of dollars to build weapon systems to defend our country. Shouldn't
we spend a fraction of that to defend what our country stands
for?
On September 11, nearly 6000
Americans lost their lives. Hundreds of those victims were ethnic
Arabs and others from the Muslim faith. Why add to the pain and
grieve of Arab and Muslim American families and communities who
are already being subjected to a racist backlash despite the
government's best efforts. Kinsley's proposition is an extension
to the backlash. CP
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