On racial profiling

I’m so sick and tired of hearing why and how racial profiling is bad. Primarily because the arguments are so goddamn stupid, that I’m not sure whether I should get a tissue for the idiot, since he’s bound to start drooling any second, or to humor him, and actually try to reason.

Do you fish? I used to. Generally, when I went fishing, I’d look at the river, and spot a couple of places where the fish is more likely to be. And usually I was right. When I wasn’t, I’d try other spots, and would stick with the ones that worked. I can also look at the neighborhood and say how likely it is to find a crack dealer there. Isn’t that ingenious of me? - Not really. While I do find the necessity of explaining how it’s done rather ludicrous, this is where the obsession with political correctness has gotten us.

Here’s why it’s good and absolutely necessary to conduct racial profiling. – How many whites were there among the terrorists of 9/11, London bombings, Madrid, Bali, Jordan? How many blacks? Anyone from the Midwest? No, huh? (gotta say it, it pisses me off to no end when I see some security guard waving his magic wand over some 80-year old lady from Wisconsin. Does anyone sincerely believe she might be concealing something other than her annoyance?!) “But does that mean that there couldn’t be one from Cuba or Midwest?” – is a typical response. Yes, actually, for all practical purposes, it does. All of them were Muslims, and most, of Arabic origins. In 9/11 most were Saudis. Absolute majority of the terrorists in the U.S. so far, have been Muslims from the Middle East. Since most of the terrorists seem to come from there, it seems only logical to focus more efforts on screening people from that region. Could it be any more self-evident? “Do most terrorists come from there?!. What about Timothy McVeigh or Ted Kaczynski? Were they also Saudis?!” – Got me there. Are there domestic wackjobs? Yes! White supremacists, disgruntled postal workers, depressed teenagers, self-appointed defenders of the disenfranchised, etc. HOWEVER, if we look at the proportion of Arab Muslims (or to be more inclusive, the good folks hailing from terrorist-producing states) to the general population of the U.S. it will be less than 10% (I’m guessing here, but I don’t think it’s more than that, probably much less). The same slice of population however would comprise well over 60% of terrorists in the U.S. So the benefit of focusing on this slice of the population is humongous.

“But if we start focusing on Arabs, the real terrorists will then coerce or bribe a Mongolian man or a Midwestern woman into carrying out the next attack. And thanks to your disregard of these groups as potential suspects, you’ll have missed them.” (Or something to that extent.) First, nobody suggests that everyone else besides Arab Muslims just waltzes into the plane or goes buying TNT unquestioned. Second, good luck to them trying to recruit an 80-year old Midwestern woman for such a mission. Third, when that happens, we’ll adjust the tactics. Trying to recruit potential terrorists outside of their “comfort” zone is a difficult and dangerous undertaking for them. Therefore it is also rather unlikely. Meanwhile, if we DID, focus on Arab Muslims or militant Muslims (call them whatever you want, we all know whom I’m talking about), our chances of preventing more attacks would be increased tremendously.

Those who oppose racial profiling, do so on the grounds of it being “racial”. And these days, anything “racial” is just unacceptable and undemocratic. Sickle cell anemia tends to afflict people of African origins considerably more than any other. Should we start screening others too, since we’re clearly selecting them based on their race? What about Tay-Sachs disease? Most (but NOT ALL) of the afflicted are of Ashkenazi Jewish origin. That’s a pretty specific group of population as well. Generally, they’re the only ones screened for it. Isn’t it a discriminatory practice then? Yes it is. In as much as discrimination means discernment, it is. And this discernment happens to be based on ethnic and geographic origins. I’d love to hear the argument for why we should make the Tay-Sachs screening tests for everyone.

And lastly, I don’t think that even those who say that racial profiling is a form of discrimination and should be illegal believe it themselves. To those who do, I say put your money where your mouth is. If you’re genuinely convinced that the chances of the next major terror act (or let’s take two out of three next ones) being perpetrated by a non-Muslim from a country that has NOT been identified as a terrorist-producing region are equal or greater than that they will be, let’s make a bet. If the next two out of three major terrorist acts are committed by individuals that fall into my “evil stereotype”, you pay me $100. If not, I pay you $100. If you believe what you say, why not make an easy hundred bucks off of an ignorant idiot like me.