It's not racist to profile based on race as long as it's done with viable statistics or other events backing it. We profile based on gender and age, we profile based on time of day and the type of car being driven, we profile based on if there's children or if there's not. Why can't we profile based on race and/or religion where there is a solid basis to do so?
While it is true that more terrorist attacks have been conceived by non-Muslims to be taken out on US Soil, the truth is there is not always a link to radical Islamic groups such as ISIS or others, even when such a link did exist. Persons can be "non-Islamic terrorists" yet still have been influenced by ISIS and other Islamic extremist groups. Furthermore, as shown below, while the rate is much higher among non-Muslim terror attacks, the deaths are about the same. This shows that, even though they may not happen as often, radical Islamic terror attacks tend to be much more deadly when they do.
As one example, my mother and sister recently had to fly, last minute (12 hour advance purchase) cross country to visit my grandmother in hospice. The tickets were purchased for one way, no advance notice, and no checked baggage. These are three red-flags. My mother was subjected to extra screening at 4:00 am at the airport. My adolescent sister was not. This is a prime example of how profiling is supposed to work - add up all of the red flags, determine if someone warrants or does not warrant additional attention. Since age and gender are used, why can race not be used as well?
A second question to be posed is if we are to allow race to be used in determining college admissions, even to the point that someone can be denied admission simply because there was someone of equal or even slightly lower qualification who was a different race, why can we not permit racial profiling?
There are bad people in every bunch. However the vast majority of police and transportation security agents aren't inherently racially biased, and I think that giving them the tool of being able to profile based on race would add to their ability to prevent attacks or attempted attacks on US soil, especially airliners.
For thought:
UK article about the success of racial profiling in use at El Al
Another
HuffPo article regarding giving police enough tools to enable the "human factor" to increase security
Another article from a historically liberally biased media about how secure El Al is
And lastly a 60 Minutes article about it which I will quote below
Note how an attack was possibly (nobody can know for sure) prevented on an El Al flight by the use of intimidation, interrogation, searching, and marshalling, and most importantly they profiled him based on age, sex, demeanor, and possibly race.
"Words do not scare us. Bombs do." Personally, I could care less if you're offended by the word or idea of "profiling". Considering its track record in Israel's air travel industry, I strongly prefer potentially subjecting innocent people to a bit extra interrogation (while, by the way causing security times to drop to half an hour or less for others) over having a repeat of 9/11 or the WTC bombing, etc.
While it is true that more terrorist attacks have been conceived by non-Muslims to be taken out on US Soil, the truth is there is not always a link to radical Islamic groups such as ISIS or others, even when such a link did exist. Persons can be "non-Islamic terrorists" yet still have been influenced by ISIS and other Islamic extremist groups. Furthermore, as shown below, while the rate is much higher among non-Muslim terror attacks, the deaths are about the same. This shows that, even though they may not happen as often, radical Islamic terror attacks tend to be much more deadly when they do.
As one example, my mother and sister recently had to fly, last minute (12 hour advance purchase) cross country to visit my grandmother in hospice. The tickets were purchased for one way, no advance notice, and no checked baggage. These are three red-flags. My mother was subjected to extra screening at 4:00 am at the airport. My adolescent sister was not. This is a prime example of how profiling is supposed to work - add up all of the red flags, determine if someone warrants or does not warrant additional attention. Since age and gender are used, why can race not be used as well?
A second question to be posed is if we are to allow race to be used in determining college admissions, even to the point that someone can be denied admission simply because there was someone of equal or even slightly lower qualification who was a different race, why can we not permit racial profiling?
There are bad people in every bunch. However the vast majority of police and transportation security agents aren't inherently racially biased, and I think that giving them the tool of being able to profile based on race would add to their ability to prevent attacks or attempted attacks on US soil, especially airliners.
For thought:
UK article about the success of racial profiling in use at El Al
Another
HuffPo article regarding giving police enough tools to enable the "human factor" to increase security
Another article from a historically liberally biased media about how secure El Al is
And lastly a 60 Minutes article about it which I will quote below
"The first thing: Where is your suitcase? You are not going to the United States without any suitcase," says Dror. "How, where are you going to spend your time? Are you, are you going to sleep naked in the Central Park? What are you going to do over there without suitcase? So, this is the first question and that (will) raise a lot of red lights."
In fact, the Israelis got a chance to ask Reid a lot of questions, because he flew El Al last summer. They didn't like the look of him, so they checked everything in his bags, and everything he was wearing, and then put an armed sky marshal in the seat right next to him.
In fact, the Israelis got a chance to ask Reid a lot of questions, because he flew El Al last summer. They didn't like the look of him, so they checked everything in his bags, and everything he was wearing, and then put an armed sky marshal in the seat right next to him.
Before she started working at the airport, Rosen was in the Israeli army, in intelligence. She and the people working under her are profilers. That's what they're called. They question passengers, sometimes extensively, to see if they match secret profiles of suspected terrorists.
"Profile" may be a dirty word in the United States. But Sneh's reaction is: "We have to secure our passengers, our airplanes, and words do not scare us. Bombs do."
"Profile" may be a dirty word in the United States. But Sneh's reaction is: "We have to secure our passengers, our airplanes, and words do not scare us. Bombs do."