[August]

Originally Posted by Kissaki

EDIT: I'm terribly sorry, I just checked and realized that it was SixPack, not you, who started this thread. Because of your post-counts your avatars are the same, and I'm used to recognizing forumites by their avatars. My bad.

No problem i've nearly done the same thing myself more than once.

I get the feeling from your words here that if it was up to you, there would be.

Well you're wrong. Racial profiling is a bad thing because of its potential for abuse. On the other hand in our zeal to avoid any appearance of such impropriety our airport security wastes valuable time and resources strip searching little old ladies, members of Congress and detaining octegenarian retired Airforce general, medal of honor winners from Texas. All i'd want is to see is some common sense applied when selecting which airline passengers should be scrutinized more closely.

And I know there are many who would welcome it. Governments tend to be more level-headed than the people they govern, though. I remember immediately after 911, anyone with a turban was a murderer, and some (I grant you, not many to my knowledge) mosques were attacked. But Bush had to make a public statement almost immediately telling America that such retribution was not tolerated.

Here in Providence, on 9-11, a couple of hours after the attack, the cops detained a Sikh for a short time, reportedly because of the ceremonial knife he was carrying, but more likely because of his appearance, primarily the turban he was wearing, so there is some truth in that. However, some over reactions on the part of individuals is just human nature and is to be expected in any emergency situation. The true test is how the government and people as a whole deal and discourage such things.

On the whole I thought the US did a good job of respecting the rights of Muslims throughout that entire period. Contrast that with an unsubstanciated report of disrespecting a Koran by a Guantanamo guard that results in mass riots and demonstrations by 10s of thousands across the middle east, resulting in the death and injury of westerners who had absolutely nothing to do with it.

Didn't say it was, mate. But on the same token, the "infidel" cliché isn't valid for all Muslims, either.

Unfortunately it's valid for enough of them that organizations like al quaeda and others are tolerated and recieve fairly large amounts of support, right up to and including at the governmental level.

When it comes to those examples, then yes. But Iraq was, for example, subject to a debilitating embargo which caused a humanitarian crisis, plus they had little alternative but to trade its oil with the West. Sure you may argue that "Saddam started it", but the average Iraqi citizen just knew where the embargo came from.

I disagree. Saddam did more than start it, he deliberately created that humanitarian crisis in order to put pressure on the west, by redirecting and withholding the humanitarian aid the west was rendering to ease the suffering of the Iraq people. Far from blaming the coalition, I think Iraqi citizens like the Kurds and the Shiites knew exactly who was the real cause of their misery.