Can someone in the Irving TX area "draft" this young man? [Archive]

tindleroot

16-09-2015, 13:03

If our culture sees electronics with 7 segment displays as nothing but bombs, then we really need to keep working on changing that culture.

Cory's answer defines the actual issue.

When I was a sophomore in my high school Aerospace class, we built model rockets and my group's rocket looked pretty awesome so I decided to keep the rocket. During lunch that day, one of our deans walked up and examined it to make sure it didn't have an engine/bomb/explosive in it. He was not particularly worried or suspicious, he just needed to "make sure". I wonder if it would have changed for me if I had been from the same cultural/religious background as this poor kid.

This year I am participating in a seminar course discussing the implications and definitions of terrorism, and from what we've discussed in class it is really stupid to think that this kid is a terrorist. If the school is jumping to these conclusions, then they are misinformed about what terrorism is. The issue of terrorism goes much further than the shallow thinking that these school officials are exerting.

Akash Rastogi

16-09-2015, 13:16

100% guaranteed this "overreaction" doesn't occur if he is white and his name isn't Ahmed Mohammed...that's the real problem.

Don't you know? Kids who wear NASA shirts to school are obviously up to no good and hate America...

JB987

16-09-2015, 13:19

100% guaranteed this "overreaction" doesn't occur if he is white and his name isn't Ahmed Mohammed...that's the real problem.

+1

Akash Rastogi

16-09-2015, 13:21

In a positive update, the kid just got a personal invite to the White House by POTUS.

:)

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/644193755814342656

FrankJ

16-09-2015, 13:41

Boy, we have been bringing our "cannon" to all sorts of school events. Good thing it doesn't have a count down clock on it. :rolleyes:

The teacher reportedly thinks it looks like a bomb and keeps it. Does that sound like a good plan?

Foster

16-09-2015, 13:44

Stereotypical bombs have a large countdown clock.

Yes they do. This one was a clock, so I think it was counting UP. That makes it harder to be a bomb.

Related, someone found on Amazon these $4 clock kits (with free shipping) (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B014J4HKIM/fosterworld) and are sending them to the school.

Feel free to help start the STEM program there:

MacArthur High School
attn: Daniel Cummings
3700 N MacArthur Blvd,
Irving, TX 75062

Or send a clock kit to your local high school, maybe you can get one of your local kids a trip to DC to meet the President!

I'm happy for him that it's going to work out, sad that it happened in the first place.

logank013

16-09-2015, 13:51

Haha. Yeah, after seeing what some of you all responded to my post, there are some majors issues with the teacher who reported this.

RoboChair

16-09-2015, 13:59

Gone are the days that kids building rockets, jets, and blowing stuff up is considered normal and encouraged, or at least tolerated with stern warnings. There have been far too many stories involving those subjects ending up very poorly for young people when the law gets involved(a friend of my wife got a felony conviction for experimentation). People see it as a threat and something that should be punished, but forget that that is how many people got into science and engineering, especially those involved in the early NASA programs. I have luckily managed to be smart enough about my more questionable experiments so as to avoid this very issue coming up. It feels wrong to know that some of the things I've done that have taught me a great deal about science and engineering carry with them a potential for jail time.

FrankJ

16-09-2015, 14:01

Haha. Yeah, after seeing what some of you all responded to my post, there are some majors issues with the teacher who reported this.

To be honest & only knowing the story over the internet, I am not sure the English teacher did anything wrong. Doesn't everybody carry around dual function bomb/alarm clocks? :) The administration and the police however way overreacted. At least the police had the common sense to admit it and drop it.

Foster

16-09-2015, 14:02

IndySam

16-09-2015, 14:25

100% guaranteed this "overreaction" doesn't occur if he is white and his name isn't Ahmed Mohammed...that's the real problem.

Especially when it's white males that are the perpetrators of school place violence.

It also come down to zero-tolerance policies that removes administrators common sense from the equation.

ChuckDickerson

16-09-2015, 14:40

I’m a grown man and this whole situation is so infuriating on so many levels that it makes me just want to cry because I am so ashamed of the level of racism, islamophobia, fear, and just plain ignorance, stupidity, and absurdity in this country.

marshall

16-09-2015, 14:47

100% guaranteed this "overreaction" doesn't occur if he is white and his name isn't Ahmed Mohammed...that's the real problem.

QFT.

Wayne Doenges

16-09-2015, 15:11

Look how far we have come.
I was on the high school shooting team and I had a rifle at the school.
Recruit this student.

JohnBoucher

16-09-2015, 15:40

FIRST... Invite this kid to champs!

Ryan_Todd

16-09-2015, 16:42

Team 3370- Aftershock, is based out of Irving.

I've found a Twitter account and a Facebook page for 3370, but their listed website address is down and neither social media account has seen any activity since 2012.

Does anyone have any current contact info so that we can tip them off? (assuming, of course, that they haven't had the same idea already)

Karthik

16-09-2015, 17:29

FIRST... Invite this kid to champs!

They're already on it!

https://twitter.com/FIRSTweets/status/644227180210319360
https://twitter.com/FIRSTweets/status/644250066413293568

jvriezen

16-09-2015, 17:37

Look how far we have come.
I was on the high school shooting team and I had a rifle at the school.
Recruit this student.

High school Trap shooting teams have become very popular lately in MN. But all related activities are done at shooting ranges, off school property.

GaryVoshol

16-09-2015, 17:51

From the news story:

He loved robotics club in middle school and was searching for a similar niche in his first few weeks of high school.

Somebody in TX find a way to contact him, his science (not English) teacher, or the principal.

RoboChair

16-09-2015, 18:31

There is also Team 5786 in Irving.
http://unhprobotics.co.vu/

Greg Needel

16-09-2015, 19:07

Rest assured, there are a few things in the works to try and get him involved.

Greg

neshera

16-09-2015, 19:28

Rest assured, there are a few things in the works to try and get him involved.

Greg

Thanks, Astronaut Chris Hadfield!
Thanks FIRST headquarters!
and, not sarcastically, "Thanks, Obama!"

Jon236

16-09-2015, 21:54

Good work Chris, Mr. President and FIRST! Thanks for lighting the fire Greg!

dtengineering

16-09-2015, 22:07

The police should know how to tell if it is a movie bomb... you pull the red wire and it stops at 00:00:01

I mean, that's why evil doers put clocks on their bombs, isn't it... so that the good guys know when to pull the red wire?

Mind you, should I ever become a super villain, I'm setting all my bombs to explode at 00:00:02.

Jason

sanddrag

16-09-2015, 22:50

runneals

16-09-2015, 22:52

I was talking with one of his friends on Facebook tonight (of course I shared this thread with him), and it sounds like they'll be looking to join an FTC team (I told him to contact the FIRST Senior Mentor Joe, so if you want them, better talk to Joe :D)!
Also thought I'd share what his friend told me about him (hope he doesn't mind, but it made me smile and restored my hope in humanity, which isn't that what FIRST is about?): "He's really good at engineering and robotics, he would always come up to me and we would talk about what he was working on, I really don't have the tools to do that, my soldering gun broke, But I do love learning about it."

Greg Needel

17-09-2015, 00:18

So just a couple of things that have happened today.

* We offered him a free membership to the Dallas Makerspace (we have a 17,000 sqft facility with everything you could imagine and 1,000 members.

*He was offered some free parts from at minimum AndyMark and REV (maybe others but I have no direct knowledge)

*I reached out to him and invited him to come visit 2848 ( I can't offer him a direct spot on the team as the administration would need to be involved but I am hopeful he considers our school if he transfers from his own)

We do want him to land on a team this year, but alot depends on what school he lands at. There are some options for starting new teams this year (FTC or FRC) but as many of you know there is alot that goes into that type of commitment. I feel confidant that we can get their registration covered if it is a new team, but I think it is likely he might land at a school which is already covered.

I personally would like to still form a team of some type at his existing (old school) as there is a cultural change that needs to happen there and having a team there would help with that quite a bit assuming there is enough interest.

I also know that he was offered a trip the Maker Faire in NYC next weekend and a trip to the White House (which he has accepted). I am sure there have been many other offers to help and that personally he will be fine. The main thing we all need to take away from this is that no matter how good many of us have it inside our own STEM celebrating communities, there are loads of places where students don't have an outlet. When your teams are planning community events and demos I urge you all to make sure that you consider doing demos for people who have little exposure to this kind of thing and make education and acceptance part of your message in addition to talking about your team. While many of us laugh at the notion that what he made was interpreted as a Bomb, we may be in the cultural minority. Just remember this is FOR INSPIRATION AND RECOGNITION OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY.

I am proud to be part of this community that is so quick to help people in need, but lets use this incident as a spring board to continue our goals of culture change.

Cory

17-09-2015, 00:42

I personally would like to still form a team of some type at his existing (old school) as there is a cultural change that needs to happen there and having a team there would help with that quite a bit assuming there is enough interest

I don't mean this as a dig at you, as I think what you're doing is great, but the culture change they need is to stop seeing any non-white person as a terrorist. It's got nothing to do with being more aware of STEM activities.

The problem isn't that they couldn't figure out he had a clock and not a bomb...it's that they saw a brown kid with both "Ahmed" and "Mohamed" in his name and freaked out because they're either subconsciously or outwardly racist/Islamophobic.

dtengineering

17-09-2015, 00:53

I don't mean this as a dig at you, as I think what you're doing is great, but the culture change they need is to stop seeing any non-white person as a terrorist. It's got nothing to do with being more aware of STEM activities.

The problem isn't that they couldn't figure out he had a clock and not a bomb...it's that they saw a brown kid with both "Ahmed" and "Mohamed" in his name and freaked out because they're either subconsciously or outwardly racist/Islamophobic.

Not to disagree with your analysis of the thinking (or lack thereof) behind these events, but I will suggest that gracious professionalism includes a lot more than just STEM. FIRST does a pretty darn good job of cultivating an inclusive, supportive environment for everyone.

Jason

Greg Needel

17-09-2015, 01:00

I don't mean this as a dig at you, as I think what you're doing is great, but the culture change they need is to stop seeing any non-white person as a terrorist. It's got nothing to do with being more aware of STEM activities.

The problem isn't that they couldn't figure out he had a clock and not a bomb...it's that they saw a brown kid with both "Ahmed" and "Mohamed" in his name and freaked out because they're either subconsciously or outwardly racist/Islamophobic.

I agree with you 100% about the racial issues at play here and while I agree with you that those are the much bigger ones to solve. Unfortunately I don't think that I am qualified to be the one working to proactively change people's minds in that regards. I will support those efforts how I can, but that is a situation where I will follow but can't lead (besides by example of my personal actions).

On the other hand technical mentoring and training is something that I can help with, and where I feel like my efforts can have a bigger impact.

cbale2000

17-09-2015, 03:27

Ok, so when I first heard about this story I was totally behind this kid. Then I actually saw a picture of his clock...

http://www.dallasnews.com/incoming/20150916-0916ahmedclock.jpg.ece/BINARY/0916ahmedclock.jpg

So, I'll still think basically anyone who looked at this for more than 30 seconds should have been able to recognize that this was not, in fact, a bomb. That said, I think, had it been me, I would have found a different way to house the electronics. The metal "briefcase" was... less than ideal.

[/2cents]

Kevin Sheridan

17-09-2015, 04:23

The metal "briefcase" was... less than ideal.

[/2cents]

The housing is just a pencil case. (http://www.amazon.com/Vaultz-Locking-Pencil-Inches-VZ01479/dp/B001BXZ28K) Its pretty much the ideal housing for a small electronics project that a high school freshman complete in less than a day...

Roger

17-09-2015, 07:16

Do you think that all those invites should also be going to the administrators? Sounds like they are the ones that need some education.

In other news I googled "movie bombs" and got a list of box office theatre failures. Is that what they are supposed to look like? :)

MechEng83

17-09-2015, 08:04

Foster

17-09-2015, 09:22

Related, someone found on Amazon these $4 clock kits (with free shipping) (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B014J4HKIM/fosterworld) and are sending them to the school.

Feel free to help start the STEM program there:

MacArthur High School
attn: Daniel Cummings
3700 N MacArthur Blvd,
Irving, TX 75062'

That's hilarious, and awesome. Reminds me of the Nuts for Jericho (http://abcnews.go.com/Business/FunMoney/story?id=3214156&page=1) campaign. I would love to see this take off in that way. If you really get the internet behind something and it takes off, you'd have enough sent over there to where every kid in the whole school district could build one!

Yep, I sent 5 kits worth, lets hope they get to someone and not the trash.

So, I'll still think basically anyone who looked at this for more than 30 seconds should have been able to recognize that this was not, in fact, a bomb. That said, I think, had it been me, I would have found a different way to house the electronics. The metal "briefcase" was... less than ideal.

Right it is a makeup case that you can get online or at Target. I have a pair of them. One has Arduino stuff in it (board, shields, cable, power brick, etc.) and the other has the stuff for a Raspberry Pi demo. They are small, sturdy and come in colors. (Blue is Arduino since the board is blue). They can bang around in the back of the car and not damage the electronics.

1/2 of the effort in any electronics project is trying to find a case, getting knobs mounted and labeled so it all looks nice. He took the time to put the school mascot on it. Evil Geniuses don't do that (ok,maybe a "shark with laser sticker", but never Left Shark)

FrankJ

17-09-2015, 09:33

The picture is deceiving in relation to the size of the case. it's 8.25" x 5.5" x 2.5" not really "briefcase" size. Its major dimensions are smaller than a sheet of paper (actually about half the size).

So closed it looks like a little case. Not pressure cooker in a backpack. Open there is clearly no explosive or shards of metal that you would into a bomb. Maybe the electronics took up too much room? :]

neshera

17-09-2015, 09:57

I don't know why I didn't think of this when I started this thread, but for Heaven's sake don't let him join FRC Team 16!:rolleyes: :yikes:

MechEng83

17-09-2015, 10:03

I don't know why I didn't think of this when I started this thread, but for Heaven's sake don't let him join FRC Team 16!:rolleyes: :yikes:

You mean the Clock Squad?

FrankJ

17-09-2015, 10:05

I don't know why I didn't think of this when I started this thread, but for Heaven's sake don't let him join FRC Team 16!:rolleyes: :yikes:

Team 16 totally needs to send him a tee shirt!! Wear it with pride to the white house.

Disclaimer: I am totally unrelated to Team 16 other than being an admirer of their program. I understand they are discrete as to where they wear their "Bomb Squad" tee shirts.

ChuckDickerson

17-09-2015, 10:09

What I’m trying to figure out is how the alarm on the clock went off in his backpack during his 6th period English class. The clock appears to be the AC powered innards with a 9VDC plug for battery backup. If it was in his backpack how was it plugged into the wall?

I am assuming he didn’t actually design/build a clock from scratch but rather assembled parts and pieces from one or more consumer alarm clocks (possibly broken) and put them together in this case and made them work. No matter what he did: design and build a clock from scratch, put broken pieces together, buy a clock kit somewhere online and solder it up, or whatever, I applaud him for good old fashioned inquisitiveness and creativity. His actions should be celebrated not punished. Back when I was a kid I had a habit of “taking things apart to see how they work”. This was encouraged behavior. If something was broken like an alarm clock, a microwave, a TV, a tape deck, a movie projector, etc. I always got to tear into it before it hit the trash. What happened to those days? When did this become something that would get you arrested for attempting to make a “hoax bomb”? Oh wait, I’m sorry, I forgot, I was a white kid.

marshall

17-09-2015, 11:01

FrankJ

17-09-2015, 11:21

While i don't deny that skin color, name,... played an issue. Rigid policies, zero tolerance, embedded resource officers (police) have led to lot of silliness in school discipline - for everybody.

On the other side of the coin. He has received a ground swell of support.

Doug Frisk

17-09-2015, 11:37

What I’m trying to figure out is how the alarm on the clock went off in his backpack during his 6th period English class. The clock appears to be the AC powered innards with a 9VDC plug for battery backup. If it was in his backpack how was it plugged into the wall?

I expect that it had a nine volt battery connected while it was in his backpack. I also expect EOD removed it to safe the device.

marshall

17-09-2015, 11:40

Monochron

17-09-2015, 12:09

Michael Hill

17-09-2015, 15:17

Something that hasn't been clear...if they actually thought this was a bomb, why didn't they evacuate the school?

FrankJ

17-09-2015, 15:31

Something that hasn't been clear...if they actually thought this was a bomb, why didn't they evacuate the school?

Just shows the silliness of the schools position. They knew it wasn't an working bomb. Best case for them would be he intended to create a disturbance. Apparently no evidence of that either. It is a good thing it wasn't cold & Ahmed was wearing a down vest. No telling where he would be now.

Alan Anderson

17-09-2015, 17:08

if they actually thought this was a bomb

They knew it wasn't a real bomb. In their narrative, they were dealing with a kid who brought a fake bomb to school, and who wouldn't tell them why he built a fake bomb.

They treated him as uncooperative because he "...would only say that it was a clock and was not forthcoming at that time about any other details." I'm not sure what other details they expected, given that it was a clock.

Hey, you know what else is a clock? http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/img/037/0378e22d61ce9f2573bd219b3509e9d6_l.jpg

It's all cleared up now, except for the part where the authorities don't apologize, and the part where the school administration reminds everyone that hoax bombs are still prohibited. Oh, and the part where the local government officials do nothing to take back their recent smears against Muslims.

Michael Hill

17-09-2015, 17:44

That's quite the bomb there, Alan! Also, I subbed in for my boss on his golf team yesterday. I hadn't golfed in almost two years. I did okay, but out of it I found my wrist bomb I lost two years ago in my golf bag.

Foster

17-09-2015, 20:54

Where we are at that since schools have been successfully sued, they have moved the tasks normally assigned to a harried Vice-Principal to the police. They have instituted a simple framework that says "anything out of the 99.99% norm, stop them and hand them over to the police (or what ever the police in schools are called in your area "community outreach officers"). You all have "school policy" documents that say this and you all (students and parents) recently signed one giving most of your rights away.

Sadly the students in the school are taking the brunt of this, which I feel bad about. They have the world looking on them going "Really?" Which is sad. I'm sure they have heard from all their social media friends about how it must be bad to go to such an idiot school.

I'm happy that everyone has reached out to the kid, but a better ploy would be "hey your school is lacking in uber geeks, let us help create more in your school. Here is money, people, clock kits, etc to help you up the way cool STEM ladder." Just think of the difference Mark Z could make coming to the school and speaking vs having one kid come on the Facebook campus.

The school is stuck. While they will most likely be sued, for them to say "Ok, we were wrong, sorry"; will only make it worse for them in court. ISD board same boat, stuck in a corner. Irving PD, stuck, stuck, stuck. While the public shaming has been bad, their deeper fear of them paying multi-million in judgements has them continuing to double down.

BUT THERE IS A GOOD SIDE. Now is the time for all of YOU to go to your schools and go: "Hey we are tech nerds. We build all sorts of nerdy stuff that is really techy cool, like our robots (point at robot). Sometimes we have parts with us, think of it as pencils, paints and brushes for artists, musical instruments or sports equipment. You might look at a chunk of metal, black cans and wire and go "bomb", but it really is one of our awesome swerve drive wheels. So we are not trying to be disruptive, it's our cool stuff and we are excited and we want to share. Happy to fit under the zero policy, but we want our zero level to be at the same as paints, papers, hockey sticks, pom-poms, etc". Otherwise you will be in the center of a media storm that will not end for weeks and take all of us away from our biggest goal - education."

runneals

18-09-2015, 12:43

Team 16 totally needs to send him a tee shirt!! Wear it with pride to the white house.

Disclaimer: I am totally unrelated to Team 16 other than being an admirer of their program. I understand they are discrete as to where they wear their "Bomb Squad" tee shirts.

Heh... Thanks for the idea :D Just sent the idea onto the coach of Bomb Squad :D

Also, I chatted a bit with FIRST HQ, and they are also reaching out, so it sounds like they at least will be joining FIRST :D Wouldn't it be cool if he could get on an FRC team with his friends who sound like they're taught by incompetent teachers?!?! Yet somehow they are named National AP District of the Year (http://www.irvingisd.net/site/default.aspx?PageType=3&DomainID=4&ModuleInstanceID=7900&ViewID=047E6BE3-6D87-4130-8424-D8E4E9ED6C2A&RenderLoc=0&FlexDataID=8878&PageID=1) and “Top Digital District” for Use of Cutting-Edge Technology (http://www.irvingisd.net/site/default.aspx?PageType=3&DomainID=4&ModuleInstanceID=7900&ViewID=047E6BE3-6D87-4130-8424-D8E4E9ED6C2A&RenderLoc=0&FlexDataID=8876&PageID=1)

Carolyn_Grace

19-09-2015, 13:00

marshall

19-09-2015, 14:56

This is an important discussion to have, and I'm really proud of our FIRST and Robotics community for having it.

The one point I disagree on is the bashing of Ahmed's teachers. I'm in my second year teaching, and it's ridiculous how difficult it is sometimes to actually teach my content when there's so many other things happening on a daily basis. Every teacher that I've come in contact with for the past two years of my career always has the best interests at heart for their students. Sometimes that manifests in drastically different ways.

I don't blame Ahmed's teachers. The teachers are part of a larger institute that needs to take responsibility, including administration and police. But I'm slow to point fingers at the English teacher. There's very few of us silly non-STEM English teachers in the world who even know what an Arduino even is.

So yes, let's educate. (I'm educating my co-workers regularly about STEM and Robotics), but please let's also do so in a way that doesn't bash the teachers, who have enough on their plate at the moment.

This is a really good point. As the pace of change for technology accelerates, it is up to us in the engineering tribe to educate those not in it about the wonders that are out there. My mom is a retired English/Language Arts/Social Studies teacher and I'm happy to say she is still learning new stuff, even today. She probably couldn't pick out an Arduino from a Raspberry Pi but she knows her way around an iPad and understands that microcontrollers are what make it all possible.

Daisies

22-09-2015, 01:03

orangemoore

22-09-2015, 01:26

I don't mean any harm, but you guys need to do more research on a story before making all these presumptions or suggesting such drastic measures. The issue, to me, isn't that he built a clock that looked like a stereotypical IED. (Which he most likely knew it did, and brought it to school anyways. But let's be honest, a lot of harmless electronic projects can easily look like IED's to an untrained eye), but that he didn't actually build the clock from scratch, let alone "invent" it like he claims. What he brought to school was, or at least appears to be, something built in a factory. This video demonstrates and explains this in detail. https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=232&v=CEmSwJTqpgY
Even if it was something he invented, which I don't believe it is, he doesn't deserve thousands of dollars worth of gifts and a free trip to the white house. There are plenty of other kids that have done so much more than him, and I wouldn't even say they deserve free stuff. It's a nice just but it's also not a fair gesture. I don't think anyone deserves special treatment like that unless they did something really impressive, like those kids who innovate in medical, technological, and other scientific fields in a way that can potentially help society as a whole. Kids like that deserve a lot of recognition but almost always get little-to-none, while this kid who just, at best, built a simple electronic clock has gotten massive amounts of media and political attention.
There's also the possible issue with his uncle, Aldean Mohamed [his Twitter (https://twitter.com/AldeanMohamed)] being CEO of a company named "twin towers transportation" [http://www.corporationwiki.com/p/2fj827/twin-towers-transportation-corporation] which is obviously provocative, but that's no fault of Ahmed Mohamed. He isn't responsible for his family's actions. Even if he had (not saying he does have, just saying if he did) a terrible family, we shouldn't judge him for that. Just like we shouldn't consider him a hero just because of what happened to him, even though I do believe he was wronged at first. But our school system wrongs A LOT of people, and the teachers are probably required to call the police of they see something that looks similar to a bomb on a student, regardless of race or creed. Rewarding him may be with good intentions and is sentimental, but it's ultimately unfair and unreasonable.
There may have been racial profiling involved, but there's no proof of it. It's fallacious to just assume racial profiling is what happened in this situation, even if you personally think it's probable (Which I agree that is is a high possibility, there is a lot of Antisemitism in our country. But it's still wrong to assume that this is the case). Situations like this have happened many times before, so it's not like it's exclusive to Mr. Mohamed, or Muslims at all. (though it's stupid that they didn't evacuate the school, that should be standard protocol with a bomb threat. But that's how our school system typically is, dumb and constantly takes extreme measures against kids who usually didn't actually do anything wrong)

He has never claimed that he invented what he made but he still built it. Most students don't do the kind of things that he did. I personally can say that I wish I did the things that he does but I just don't put the time in.

Maybe other people have done more to deserve the recognition he has gotten but the price he has paid is being arrested for something that he did not do. And that seems very likely that he was racially profiled for.

If someone really thought what he brought in was a bomb; why didn't they stop touching/handling it, evacuate the school, and call the bomb squad? Saying it is just stupid they didn't evacuate the school is an understatement. Based on the response of the school district and how they want to protect all of the students they serve, they failed that objective when the first idea that it was a bomb came up and they didn't get the students away from it.

If anyone had any common sense and believed it to really be a bomb the first thing to do to protect the "All students" would have been to evacuate the school. The story of the school and the police don't add up to someone truly believing that there was some type of bomb threat.

He really seemed to be racially profiled to me because when he insisted that it was a clock the police were still called. When the police interviewed him they kept asking what it was and he always had the same response: "It is a clock". Why did the police keep asking? If someone gives you one answer constantly to the same question you ask over and over again, isn't it a pointless question?

Also by the definition of a bomb that the school/police went by literally includes all electronic devices. So phones, calculators, clocks, watches, ipods, ipads, computers, etc.

You make a lot of statements counting them as fact when they truly are not. And as an anonymous account on this forum you really don't get much credit.

Daisies

22-09-2015, 01:48

He has never claimed that he invented what he made but he still built it. Most students don't do the kind of things that he did. I personally can say that I wish I did the things that he does but I just don't put the time in.

Maybe other people have done more to deserve the recognition he has gotten but the price he has paid is being arrested for something that he did not do. And that seems very likely that he was racially profiled for.

If someone really thought what he brought in was a bomb; why didn't they stop touching/handling it, evacuate the school, and call the bomb squad? Saying it is just stupid they didn't evacuate the school is an understatement. Based on the response of the school district and how they want to protect all of the students they serve, they failed that objective when the first idea that it was a bomb came up and they didn't get the students away from it.

If anyone had any common sense and believed it to really be a bomb the first thing to do to protect the "All students" would have been to evacuate the school. The story of the school and the police don't add up to someone truly believing that there was some type of bomb threat.

He really seemed to be racially profiled to me because when he insisted that it was a clock the police were still called. When the police interviewed him they kept asking what it was and he always had the same response: "It is a clock". Why did the police keep asking? If someone gives you one answer constantly to the same question you ask over and over again, isn't it a pointless question?

Also by the definition of a bomb that the school/police went by literally includes all electronic devices. So phones, calculators, clocks, watches, ipods, ipads, computers, etc.

You make a lot of statements counting them as fact when they truly are not. And as an anonymous account on this forum you really don't get much credit.

I'm not sure if he himself claimed he invented it, it might have just been mainstream media saying that, but his father did say that to reporters and also had inconsistencies in the story. Like saying to CNN that (http://edition.cnn.com/2015/09/16/us/texas-student-ahmed-muslim-clock-bomb/) “it was an alarm clock that he made. He wakes up with it most mornings,” and then later saying on Dallas News (http://www.dallasnews.com/news/community-news/northwest-dallas-county/headlines/20150915-irving-ninth-grader-arrested-after-taking-homemade-clock-to-school.ece) he made the clock in 20 minutes the night before taking it to school.

I didn't put much emphasis on the bomb threat because that wasn't a concern of mine, I just addressed it since it was a major part of why people have been taking sides. I myself think the school overreacted, but again, being wronged doesn't mean you deserve anything. Let alone what he got. My point wasn't that there are people who deserve reward more than him, my point was that people don't deserve rewards for being wronged. Let alone thousands of dollars worth of rewards and a free trip to the white house. Those should be things that are earned, not given to you because something bad happened to you.

I feel the same way about the families of, for example, 9/11 victims' families, who were given millions of dollars of tax payer's money in return for their lost one. They didn't need, let alone deserve, that money, which could have been used for rebuilding the city or for people who DID need it. They did deserve any sort of life insurance that they may have had with that family member, but what was given to them wasn't this and was just wasteful, unfair charity.

"You make a lot of statements counting them as fact when they truly are not."
Tell me which statements I made that were like this.
Also, "as an anonymous account on this forum you really don't get much credit." is fallacious. Popularity=/=credibility. Additionally, I'm not anonymous. Daisies is the handle I use for everything, when it's available, and I'm not hiding my identity or location.

Daisies

22-09-2015, 02:10

When the police interviewed him they kept asking what it was and he always had the same response: "It is a clock". Why did the police keep asking? If someone gives you one answer constantly to the same question you ask over and over again, isn't it a pointless question?

Also by the definition of a bomb that the school/police went by literally includes all electronic devices. So phones, calculators, clocks, watches, ipods, ipads, computers, etc.

Forgot to respond to these 2 statements in my last reply.
First of all, that is a standard police practice that they use as a way to find inconsistencies in someone's story. They ask the same questions over and over again to see if you ever change your answer, and if you do change you answer (which happens a lot, sometimes even with people telling the truth who just slip up), they use that against you. It's not considered evidence, but it's still an inconsistency that can be used against you if the case goes to court.

Second of all, I was talking about devices with open wires, "motherboard" and timer inside a case. To an untrained eye, it looks like a barebones (without explosive components) case bomb. In the context of what happened, it seems like there was racial profiling involved (on the school's end. Makes no sense that they didn't take any of the necessary actions during a bomb threat, but still claim that they thought it was a bomb) but everyone was jumping to this conclusion before we knew any of this, and even know we shouldn't assume everyone involved was racially profiling him. It's likely that a couple of people were, but extremely unlikely that a majority of them were. From what we know about the story, the police took standard protocol. One of the officers, according to some media sources, made dumb comments, but that doesn't mean the rest agree with him. (I believe they say he said "That's who I was expecting", which looks like it's a racially charged comment, but it could have easily been taken out of context. I'm suspicious of that officer, but I'm not going to judge him until I know all of what he said.)

In closing, I would hesitate to make conclusive statements on the situation itself (I was more-so talking about things surrounding the actual situation, like the rewards and the way people/mainstream media has reacted) until all the evidence is gathered and apparent. Until that time, we can only participate in conjecture. Perhaps the truth lies somewhere in the middle, but hopefully a sufficient amount of concrete evidence is provided soon to make things more clear. I'm not judging the boy, just pointing out the possibility that he was acting like a typical mischievous teenager (and if it turns out that's the case, then I would judge him. But there's no evidence to support this. He certainly doesn't look like a mischievous boy, but looks can be deceiving). The only thing I'm judging is the people who are rewarding him and labeling him as a hero.

orangemoore

22-09-2015, 03:00

I'm not sure if he himself claimed he invented it, it might have just been mainstream media saying that, but his father did say that to reporters and also had inconsistencies in the story. Like saying to CNN that (http://edition.cnn.com/2015/09/16/us/texas-student-ahmed-muslim-clock-bomb/) “it was an alarm clock that he made. He wakes up with it most mornings,” and then later saying on Dallas News (http://www.dallasnews.com/news/community-news/northwest-dallas-county/headlines/20150915-irving-ninth-grader-arrested-after-taking-homemade-clock-to-school.ece) he made the clock in 20 minutes the night before taking it to school.\

News Agencies sometimes over simplify facts to make the story simple. Honestly it doesn't really make a difference how long he had the clock if it was a day or a year.

I didn't put much emphasis on the bomb threat because that wasn't a concern of mine, I just addressed it since it was a major part of why people have been taking sides. I myself think the school overreacted, but again, being wronged doesn't mean you deserve anything. Let alone what he got. My point wasn't that there are people who deserve reward more than him, my point was that people don't deserve rewards for being wronged. Let alone thousands of dollars worth of rewards and a free trip to the white house. Those should be things that are earned, not given to you because something bad happened to you.

I think the gifts and other things he has gotten are ways for people show their support. They want to make it extremely vocal what happened is wrong and what he is doing (being interested in STEM) is cool. If you don't think he should have gotten I have nothing more to say.

I feel the same way about the families of, for example, 9/11 victims' families, who were given millions of dollars of tax payer's money in return for their lost one. They didn't need, let alone deserve, that money, which could have been used for rebuilding the city or for people who DID need it. They did deserve any sort of life insurance that they may have had with that family member, but what was given to them wasn't this and was just wasteful, unfair charity.

UNFAIR CHARITY?!?
I have literally nothing say about this except, WOW.
9/11 victims families were people who actually needed it.

Also, "as an anonymous account on this forum you really don't get much credit." is fallacious. Popularity=/=credibility. Additionally, I'm not anonymous. Daisies is the handle I use for everything, when it's available, and I'm not hiding my identity or location.
So what is your name then? Are you on an FRC team or other FIRST team?

Foster

22-09-2015, 03:29

Daisies, you appear to be a CD troll, with your only three posts in the last few hours all getting negative responses. While opposing views on CD are welcome, I don't think your writings are. But as all things CD, I'm going to take you at face value.

I'm not going to go back and attempt to refute your points by a point by point response. I will respond to main part of your "ideas"

-- Family and their activities in the Muslim community. Yay for them. They are devout Muslims and are doing things to protect their faith. The father tried to stop a Florida "minister" from doing a mass burning of the Koran (the equivalent of Christianity Bible). This isn't the 1500-1600's and the Crusades. Who / what / when they worship is up to them. I worship the "Sourcebook of Electronic Components"

-- It's a RadioShack clock, not something he built. Who cares? I've left a huge swath of disassembled radios, TVs, high voltage neon signs, computers, two and four stroke engines both gas and diesel equipment, and who knows what of junk components from electronic recyclers. Some of it got repurposed, some of it was junked after I learned about it, some more I paid serious dollars to get it reassembled and working. ALL OF IT WAS A LEARNING EXPERIENCE. He's 14, there are posts saying "Well when I could first crawl I took apart grandma's TV. Good for them, good for this kid at 14, he's trying to learn. The 28 year old lit teacher also had a learning experience. You are never too old to take stuff apart. Get a butter knife out and take your laptop apart right now!!! Learn something!

-- The school got into their "Zero Tolerance Policy" roadmap where all destinations are Failtown. "It's beeping. What is that? It's a clock. Ok, shut it off and sit down." One possible path. The path they took was "What is that? It's a clock. Looks like a bomb. Shut it off and when class is over we will start the process of `bringing things to school that do not have school district numbers' ". Which all end up with police action.

The school called the police from a town that has an avowed Muslim hater as a Mayor. Four officers show up and question a 14 year old boy, without his parents, a lawyer for 3 hours about a clock. After that, hand cuffed (for his safety!!) and transported to a detention center to be photographed and fingerprinted.

-- Treasures heaped upon this student. People heard and did individual things. It wasn't a coordinated effort. The President invited him to come to the Whitehouse. And while people are out there going "Of course, our Muslim President is helping a Muslim kid (false, the president is a Christian) I look at it as more of a geek President is helping a geek kid.

Facebook, Apple, Intel, etc, etc "Come see us". Easy to do for them. I'd rather see them come to the school and present to the TEACHERS on how cool geeks can be and the geek tech we use. Come present to students that geeks that have made their lives better come in multiple shades of skin colors, multiple religions, multiple countries, multiple sexual preferences and are all "people". But it appears that I don't tell them what to do and it's not my money.

In "Foster World" (tm) this would have been handled differently. In this Earth timeline it was handled poorly. They could have taken all that money, time and future effort to reach out to more future roboteers.

-- Lastly, please don't visit my house. My workbench is covered with devices with wires all over, flashing LED in both lights and 8 segment display formats. Lots of the stuff is mounted in Sugru, a white Playdo like substance that looks a lot like movie C4. The stuff is great for building little containers for small circuits until I win Powerball and can buy a 3D printer.

-- Summary: Kid new to ripping things apart does a project and takes it to school. School invokes "Zero tolerance == Zero Success cause we dump stuff on the police". Police handle the situation badly. World sees and tries to right a single injustice.

It catches Daisies eye, since it's tech related, but if they would Google search "other screwed up thing in the world" they will find a litany of "Wow is that going on?" things in the world and see that other people are trying to fix other things. We all pick the stuff that we think is wrong and try to fix it.

I'm a robotics Mentor. I'm trying to improve my small corner of this Earth Timeline. There is way too much broken things in this timeline. If you have time Daisies to complain about how other people are making a difference, it's clear that YOU are not working hard enough to make a difference. I run my test "is it helping?" In this case one kid, and since I deal in the "one roboteer success" program, they pass, so I turn back to my job as a Mentor.

Good luck Daisies on helping the world.

ratdude747

22-09-2015, 07:45

Hey, NASA has reached out:

Chris Hadfield ‏@Cmdr_Hadfield (NASA Astronaut)

Hi @IStandWithAhmed ! I'd love you to join us for our science show Generator in Toronto on 28 Oct. There's a ticket waiting for you.

Slight nitpick: Chris Hadfield is a CSA astronaut... Hence why he would be doing a show in Toronto. AFAIK out of all CSA astronauts over the years, he's the most accomplished (even getting to be commander over an ISS Expidition).

wireties

22-09-2015, 09:22

... the culture change they need is to stop seeing any non-white person as a terrorist...

The problem isn't that they couldn't figure out he had a clock and not a bomb...it's that they saw a brown kid with both "Ahmed" and "Mohamed" in his name and freaked out because they're either subconsciously or outwardly racist/Islamophobic.

With respect we should be careful about making such accusations. The teacher(s) may have been confused. It may be zero-tolerance school policy to call the police (also maybe a bad idea but made by the school board not the teachers, counselors and principals). Then the police dropped it (though not nearly as quickly as they should have).

The one thing we can report, from the facts, is that the mayor's statement was ridiculous and *phobic. And we can conclude that many kids of all races and religions get in trouble at school for silly stuff (chewing pop-tarts into the shape of a gun etc).

This student was the victim of a huge injustice. But I blame the bureaucracy!

FrankJ

22-09-2015, 10:48

I don't mean any harm, but you guys need to do more research on a story before making all these presumptions or suggesting such drastic measures. The issue, to me, isn't that he built a clock that looked like a stereotypical IED....

Actually it looks nothing like an IED except the kind you see in the movies. No explosives, shrapnel, or bomb casing (like pressure cooker). Closed it looked like a nondescript case. Which looks more like an IED than the wires since IEDs should be nondescript, Our robotics lab is currently a mess. it has circuit boards and wires all over the place. Some of which would make effective bomb timers. We also have air rifles in the same place, but that is a different story.

As far as the school goes, I don't think the teacher did anything wrong. Something you have questions about, send to the administration. The administration is handicapped a little because privacy laws prevent them from telling their side the story. (Student may have made previous threatening statements, etc ), Legitimate bomb threats/hoaxes are serious business. I have no reason to think that was the case here, this in an hypothetical. I do know if my child was suspended based on the evidence in the media, if this could not be resolved peacefully, the school would be talking to lawyers.

(Which I agree that is is a high possibility, there is a lot of Antisemitism in our country. But it's still wrong to assume that this is the case)
I agree. Ahmed is reportedly Muslim. Antisemitism isn't the right phobia.

marshall

22-09-2015, 10:56

Actually it looks nothing like an IED except the kind you see in the movies. No explosives, shrapnel, or bomb casing (like pressure cooker). Closed it looked like a nondescript case. Which looks more like an IED than the wires since IEDs should be nondescript, Our robotics lab is currently a mess. it has circuit boards and wires all over the place. Some of which would make effective bomb timers. We also have air rifles in the same place, but that is a different story.

QFT.

I used to work for a company that makes countermeasures for IEDs. They look like garbage or backpacks (or cars) and are not put into hard cases. They don't have timers with giant cartoonish LCD displays. The electrics are made using cell phones as remote triggers, not AC coils and 9V batteries.

Foster

22-09-2015, 11:55

QFT.

I used to work for a company that makes countermeasures for IEDs. They look like garbage or backpacks (or cars) and are not put into hard cases. They don't have timers with giant cartoonish LCD displays. The electrics are made using cell phones as remote triggers, not AC coils and 9V batteries.

So when you say "QFT == Quoted for Truth", you quoted both paragraphs.

This paragraph, I have a real problem with:

As far as the school goes, I don't think the teacher did anything wrong. Something you have questions about, send to the administration. The administration is handicapped a little because privacy laws prevent them from telling their side the story. (Student may have made previous threatening statements, etc ), Legitimate bomb threats/hoaxes are serious business. I have no reason to think that was the case here, this in an hypothetical. I do know if my child was suspended based on the evidence in the media, if this could not be resolved peacefully, the school would be talking to lawyers.

The paragraph starts out with "send it to the administration". Spend a few Google seconds to find the MacArthur High School School Policy. Spend a few minutes reading it. You will find that most things that have to do with "not conforming to the rules" end up with the police. I refer to these policys as "Flow charts to Fail". You should now Google your school policy and see how many things quickly get dumped into the police process.

It wasn't a legit bomb threat. She stuffed the "bomb" into a drawer. She then carted the "bomb" to the administration. The "bomb" set on their desk until the police arrived. The police questioned the student with the "bomb" present. So I'm going to take a wild stab and think that nobody thought it was a "bomb".

The last part, "talking to lawyers" is how we got into this mess. Because people sue and school districts had to pay out lots of money, they now dump everything to the police. Days of a Vice Principal yelling at your child for being a cheesehead (*) are long gone. So if you can say "I'd sue" you get the "Flow chart to fail" as your reward.

So if you QFT, make sure what you are "QFT" is truth and not something else.

I agree. Ahmed is reportedly Muslim. Antisemitism isn't the right phobia.

The word you want is "Islamophobia". And since we are learning new words today try "Christianophobia" it is the extreme fear of Christians or the Christian faith. And in honor of the Pope arriving in the US, let's add "Catholic-phobi" is fear of, hostility towards or opposition to the Catholic Church.

Don't confuse any of them with "Cathisophobia", since it is the fear of sitting down and also is otherwise known as "Thaasophobia".

(*) Fourth generation Packer fan here, I can use the word cheesehead.

marshall

22-09-2015, 12:02

So when you say "QFT == Quoted for Truth", you quoted both paragraphs.

Hasty quoting. Not that I agree/disagree but not what I meant to do. Fixed.

ShotgunNinja

22-09-2015, 12:10

I bet a FIRST team full of foreign kids building amazing things and getting exciting about engineering would help the situation. Helping people relate to those they are prejudiced against is a good step.

I've seen several teams that were completely non-white-male, including an all-girls' team from Hawaii at the Wisconsin Regional one year and several teams from the Israel Regional and the Mexico City Regional in St. Louis. I'm so glad I got to go that year (although watching Will.I.Am try to freestyle was atrocious).

ShotgunNinja

22-09-2015, 12:15

The only thing I'm judging is the people who are rewarding him and labeling him as a hero.

How did you and I come from the same hometown? Has Kenosha gotten that bad?

logank013

22-09-2015, 12:38

I don't mean any harm, but you guys need to do more research on a story before making all these presumptions or suggesting such drastic measures. The issue, to me, isn't that he built a clock that looked like a stereotypical IED. (Which he most likely knew it did, and brought it to school anyways. But let's be honest, a lot of harmless electronic projects can easily look like IED's to an untrained eye), but that he didn't actually build the clock from scratch, let alone "invent" it like he claims. What he brought to school was, or at least appears to be, something built in a factory. This video demonstrates and explains this in detail. https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=232&v=CEmSwJTqpgY
Even if it was something he invented, which I don't believe it is, he doesn't deserve thousands of dollars worth of gifts and a free trip to the white house. There are plenty of other kids that have done so much more than him, and I wouldn't even say they deserve free stuff. It's a nice just but it's also not a fair gesture. I don't think anyone deserves special treatment like that unless they did something really impressive, like those kids who innovate in medical, technological, and other scientific fields in a way that can potentially help society as a whole. Kids like that deserve a lot of recognition but almost always get little-to-none, while this kid who just, at best, built a simple electronic clock has gotten massive amounts of media and political attention.
There's also the possible issue with his uncle, Aldean Mohamed [his Twitter (https://twitter.com/AldeanMohamed)] being CEO of a company named "twin towers transportation" [http://www.corporationwiki.com/p/2fj827/twin-towers-transportation-corporation] which is obviously provocative, but that's no fault of Ahmed Mohamed. He isn't responsible for his family's actions. Even if he had (not saying he does have, just saying if he did) a terrible family, we shouldn't judge him for that. Just like we shouldn't consider him a hero just because of what happened to him, even though I do believe he was wronged at first. But our school system wrongs A LOT of people, and the teachers are probably required to call the police of they see something that looks similar to a bomb on a student, regardless of race or creed. Rewarding him may be with good intentions and is sentimental, but it's ultimately unfair and unreasonable.
There may have been racial profiling involved, but there's no proof of it. It's fallacious to just assume racial profiling is what happened in this situation, even if you personally think it's probable (Which I agree that is is a high possibility, there is a lot of Antisemitism in our country. But it's still wrong to assume that this is the case). Situations like this have happened many times before, so it's not like it's exclusive to Mr. Mohamed, or Muslims at all. (though it's stupid that they didn't evacuate the school, that should be standard protocol with a bomb threat. But that's how our school system typically is, dumb and constantly takes extreme measures against kids who usually didn't actually do anything wrong)

The fact of the case is you're ignoring some facts. Everything I've read says the teacher kept the clock in their desk all day. the school didn't over react! They did the exact opposite of what that should have done. They should have called the police and evacuated if they did the correct procedure.

The biggest issue with this is the fact the whole thing was judged on a CASING!

If you take the casing off of every electronic device, the jumble of wires on an iPhone looks more like a bomb than an alarm clock would look. The clock was inside of a pencil case. when you opened the pencil case, you saw an LED display for the clock and 2 or 3 wires. If it was an explosive, they would have seen packs of explosives somewhere in there. The whole fact of the matter is as soon as the clock was shown to her, she should have gotten rid of it as soon as possible and the school should have been under a code red. The reason people keep reaching out to him with gifts is because he was wronged by the school system and the school system was wronged by the under reaction of the teacher. The best thing for the police to have done at the time was taken him into custody and figure out the situation. They did their job. This case is just a very weird case... period.

FrankJ

22-09-2015, 12:42

So when you say "QFT == Quoted for Truth", you quoted both paragraphs.

This paragraph, I have a real problem with:

The paragraph starts out with "send it to the administration". Spend a few Google seconds to find the MacArthur High School School Policy. Spend a few minutes reading it. You will find that most things that have to do with "not conforming to the rules" end up with the police. I refer to these policys as "Flow charts to Fail". You should now Google your school policy and see how many things quickly get dumped into the police process.

It wasn't a legit bomb threat. She stuffed the "bomb" into a drawer. She then carted the "bomb" to the administration. The "bomb" set on their desk until the police arrived. The police questioned the student with the "bomb" present. So I'm going to take a wild stab and think that nobody thought it was a "bomb".

First I agree. I think the administration thought it was a hoax bomb. If it was that in reality that then it deserves serious consequences. I have not seen anything that says Ahmed thought or acted as it was that. Once you involve the police you open up a whole different set of rules & rights. The school as a civil authority has a right to question a student in way the police do not. Second as a teacher, you are stuck following the school's policies no matter how poorly thought out. Involving the police on routine school discipline issues is bad policy.

The last part, "talking to lawyers" is how we got into this mess. Because people sue and school districts had to pay out lots of money, they now dump everything to the police. Days of a Vice Principal yelling at your child for being a cheesehead (*) are long gone. So if you can say "I'd sue" you get the "Flow chart to fail" as your reward.

The school system has gone way overboard on that. We need to advocate change in a reasonable way. Yes talking to lawyers should be the last resort. The school can afford more lawyers than I can anyway. I would hope reasonable people can come to a reasonable conclusion. I never came close to involving lawyers with my children school careers. But having on your school record suspended for making terrorist or bomb threats can effect the college you get into & rather or not you can get a security clearance later in life. That is worth a fight and not accepting it as "policy".

jman4747

22-09-2015, 13:00

I do think at least passive bias played a role on the part of the admin and teacher while the admin and police were far too robotic and inflexible. No one really tried to think through a non text bookish way to deal with this situation and part of that was because both fiction and nonfiction media had told them everything they thought they needed to know about it.

Movies and TV make bombs look obvious, news (and certain politicians) associate a religion with explosive devises, and both fiction and nonfiction media rarely associate people of color with technical or science related things reducing his chance for the benefit of the doubt. With those three things in the back of their mind (or the forefront) their decisions are unsurprising.

Just think back to when you first heard the story. It probably seemed immediately obvious to you what the teacher, admin, and police were thinking because you too know the stereotypes they acted on.

The biggest problem is that punishment was doled out despite the fact they were after all wrong, and that there was no apology.

To Daisies points:

The support piled up from multiple independent entities and just grew, plus for many it's just good publicity. But the other important aspect is that it needs to be communicated to everyone in the US and the world that even if some people in our country are going to treat people this way many, hopefully most, don't support their actions. This incident having become very high profile was a good time to say that.

wireties

23-09-2015, 12:47

First I agree. I think the administration thought it was a hoax bomb. If it was that in reality that then it deserves serious consequences.

I'm not expressing an opinion either way! But for the purposes of the discussion know that even creating a hoax bomb is all kinds of illegal in Texas.

Foster

23-09-2015, 13:39

I'm not expressing an opinion either way! But for the purposes of the discussion know that even creating a hoax bomb is all kinds of illegal in Texas.

... creating a public disturbance, disorderly public conduct, resisting arrest, ...

A wide variety of charges that he could have been arrested and charged with.

But lets not loose sight of it's a clock. He said it was a clock. It was a clock. Not a bomb, hoax bomb, pseudo bomb, etc. A clock.

FrankJ

23-09-2015, 14:40

I'm not expressing an opinion either way! But for the purposes of the discussion know that even creating a hoax bomb is all kinds of illegal in Texas.

I should have expressed myself better. A hoax bomb or even a bomb threat without any physical bomb will get you in trouble with the school and probably arrested at anywhere in the country.

What reasons, if any, the school thought this was legitimate threat, they probably cannot discuss because of privacy issues. So we are only getting the story from one side. Please don't take this as me defending the actions the school took, but acknowledging that we might not know the whole story.

logank013

23-09-2015, 21:12

Please correct me if I'm wrong but to my knowledge, the school didn't evacuate. This is a problem across the county. If there are any thoughts that they actually believe their is a real bomb in the school, the student safety should be #1, and the school should be evacuated. Same goes if they get a bomb threat. This is an issue at my school. Almost EVERY year, we get a bomb threat whether it be via phone call or written on the bathroom walls. Sometimes, it happens twice a year. I'm not exaggerating. And what did our school do? Nothing! I'm sorry, but if there is any chance of there being a bomb in the school, the student need to be evacuated in order to keep their safety the number 1 priority. And this should be at every school.

Foster

23-09-2015, 21:52

The school didn't evacuate because it was a clock. Not a bomb. It was a clock. Not a hoax bomb. It was a clock.

Once the teacher went to the administration and they called the police it became a racial attack on a 14 year old boy and his family by 3 police officers. (Not to let the school off the hook)

Not a bomb. Not a hoax bomb. Racial attack of a brown boy that has a Muslim name and is of the Muslim faith and has well known brown parents who are well know for their Muslim faith and activism. Attack by police in a town who's Mayor is a well known ilsamphobic.

Not a bomb. Racial attack.

And we will hear the "schools side" when the lawsuit is settled by the school and the police.

wireties

23-09-2015, 22:51

The school didn't evacuate because it was a clock. Not a bomb. It was a clock. Not a hoax bomb. It was a clock.

If the kid brought his case to us we would know it was a clock he took apart. And it seems his engineering teacher knew it was a clock but told him to put it away and not show it around. But it was his English teacher that took the device to the administration (after the alarm went off apparently). It is not unreasonable than an English teacher would not be sure what was going on.

Once the teacher went to the administration and they called the police it became a racial attack on a 14 year old boy and his family by 3 police officers. (Not to let the school off the hook)

Lots of schools have zero tolerance policies about things like this (we live about 30 miles from this school and I assume the policies are similar). The administration personnel involved could lose their jobs if they did not refer it to the police. And the police have standard procedures which did result in no charges (after taking too long).

Not a bomb. Not a hoax bomb. Racial attack of a brown boy that has a Muslim name and is of the Muslim faith and has well known brown parents who are well know for their Muslim faith and activism. Attack by police in a town who's Mayor is a well known ilsamphobic.

The mayor of Irving is a goofball. But should we infer that every public official in the town is a racist. Isn't that taking things too far?

What is and is not a "hoax bomb" is not up to us. The law literally says anything than can "cause concern to an official".

Not a bomb. Racial attack.

With respect, we do not know this. And charging a wide array of persons with racism is pretty out there. Note that this high school is less than 14% white so people of different colors and backgrounds is the overwhelming norm. Given the lack of information from both sides, is it responsible to throw the racism card at every turn?

Something is amiss that leads to this kid getting treated so poorly. But I'm thinking bureaucracy is more to blame.

Andrew Schreiber

24-09-2015, 00:32

Second of all, I was talking about devices with open wires, "motherboard" and timer inside a case. To an untrained eye, it looks like a barebones (without explosive components) case bomb.

I've flown with a similar mix of stuff (in place of a cartoon timer, I had an XBee set up). Flown as in, it was in my carry on bag. Only in addition to said wires and a 2S Lipo battery (which actually is mildly explosive) I also had a dozen very large servos (which look like these nice chunks of metal on the TSA scanners).. in short, to anyone who didn't know what things were, probably something to at least glance at.[1] Two different airports (Tampa and DTW) both let me through without so much as a second glance. [2]

Either TSA isn't doing their job and should apparently hire TX school teachers or there's more going on here. [3]

But, in the interest of not assuming malice where I can't prove it, I'll err on the side of this being a case of Zero Tolerance becoming Zero Common Sense.

[1] I had data sheets and order forms for everything in this box with the parts in case there was any investigation. And I'd arrived at the airport 2 hours early.

[2] Though they did make darn sure to make me get rid of my 3/4 empty tube of toothpaste because the container was more than 3 oz...

[3] What I'm hinting at, I'm white, and prejudices are totally a thing.

wireties

24-09-2015, 09:10

I've flown with a similar mix of stuff (in place of a cartoon timer, I had an XBee set up). Flown as in, it was in my carry on bag. Only in addition to said wires and a 2S Lipo battery (which actually is mildly explosive) I also had a dozen very large servos (which look like these nice chunks of metal on the TSA scanners).. in short, to anyone who didn't know what things were, probably something to at least glance at.[1] Two different airports (Tampa and DTW) both let me through without so much as a second glance. [2]

I once tried to take a similar set of H/W through (custom FPGA boards, a test harness but no batteries) the Tel Aviv airport. It cost me an entire day (was delayed 6 hours but next flight was the next day) while they asked a person to come in who was qualified to tell them my stuff was not dangerous! The same H/W usually gets me a dusting and a explosives test in most US airports, but not always. And I'm an old white guy.

Blame the bureaucracy and impeach the Irving mayor for stupidity.

Monochron

24-09-2015, 10:41

I once tried to take a similar set of H/W through (custom FPGA boards, a test harness but no batteries) the Tel Aviv airport. It cost me an entire day (was delayed 6 hours but next flight was the next day) while they asked a person to come in who was qualified to tell them my stuff was not dangerous! The same H/W usually gets me a dusting and a explosives test in most US airports, but not always. And I'm an old white guy.

Blame the bureaucracy and impeach the Irving mayor for stupidity.

I think the situation of airport security and highschool classroom security aren't all that comparable. The security measures that are in place in airports can be mandated by the government and are almost universally more strict than a Texas high school. Metal detectors, fully body scanners, cavity searches, and the like are not found in Ahmed's school. Bringing a STEM project to school should not require the same screening as bringing one to an airport.

In your case it's clear that skin color had nothing to do with it, you just brought the electronics to a place with astronomical security.

Monochron

24-09-2015, 10:48

The school didn't evacuate because it was a clock. Not a bomb. It was a clock. Not a hoax bomb. It was a clock.

To my understanding they didn't believe it was a bomb, they believed it was a hoax bomb. They didn't evacuate because the school determined early on that it wasn't going to hurt anyone.

This is the issue that I'm surprised people aren't debating more... Why did the school beleive it was a hoax bomb? They believed that Ahmed intentionally brought a fake bomb to school. They thought that he was trying to scare people by pretending to build a bomb. IFF they thought he brought in a fake bomb, then they must have thought that he had malicious intent.

Why did they think he had malicious intent?

They either believed he had malicious intent, or they were trying to harass him. It's hard to come up with a non-racial motivation for those two possibilities.

wireties

24-09-2015, 12:15

I think the situation of airport security and highschool classroom security aren't all that comparable. The security measures that are in place in airports can be mandated by the government and are almost universally more strict than a Texas high school. Metal detectors, fully body scanners, cavity searches, and the like are not found in Ahmed's school. Bringing a STEM project to school should not require the same screening as bringing one to an airport.

In many ways, the zero tolerance rules at local schools are worse than the TSA. They automatically pass almost everything up to the police. This is what I'm saying - the automatic escalation from teacher to administration to police is an entirely bureaucratic response. Many in this thread are asserting some sort of -ism is involved and that may be but it would not be the school at fault but the police. Even charging the police with -isms is a stretch w/o more information since the police also have standard operating procedures. In this case the police decided not to act further. How did the police treat the student? We don't really know. I agree with you that the local police end up being less strict than the TSA (who can sniff test things they don't understand). I disagree about the requirement for security - a bomb or gun or hoax on a plane or in a school are both great risks.

Monochron

24-09-2015, 23:23

Many in this thread are asserting some sort of -ism is involved and that may be but it would not be the school at fault but the police.

I definitely agree that the Zero Tolerance system made this situation significantly worse than it should have been. I'm just not sure that any student with some sort of electronic board in their backpack would be treated the same way. See my above post about the school determining that Ahmed had malicious intents. If the letter of the Zero Tolerance law is "if you suspect something to be a bomb, you must report it to the police", then the school still suspected him of malicious intent.

wireties

25-09-2015, 01:04

I definitely agree that the Zero Tolerance system made this situation significantly worse than it should have been. I'm just not sure that any student with some sort of electronic board in their backpack would be treated the same way. See my above post about the school determining that Ahmed had malicious intents. If the letter of the Zero Tolerance law is "if you suspect something to be a bomb, you must report it to the police", then the school still suspected him of malicious intent.

I see what you are saying. I doubt the school ever thought it was a real bomb or they would have evacuated the school. But even perpetrating a silly hoax is not legal in Texas. And like I said above I have been treated with some suspicion in airports for unusual looking stuff in my luggage. And I'm not brown or young or Muslim.

I think the kid did a silly thing. His engineering teacher told him to put it away and he didn't. But 14 year olds, of all colors, do silly things all the time. Then the bureaucracy reared its ugly head.

BBray_T1296

25-09-2015, 14:58

Please correct me if I'm wrong but to my knowledge, the school didn't evacuate. ...

In accordance with proper FEMA bomb threat procedure (https://emilms.fema.gov/is906/assets/ocso-bomb_threat_samepage-brochure.pdf)

logank013

25-09-2015, 15:46

In accordance with proper FEMA bomb threat procedure (https://emilms.fema.gov/is906/assets/ocso-bomb_threat_samepage-brochure.pdf)

Interesting. I've never seen that. But I feel like it doesn't apply to the situation of this case. If this teacher actually thought that clock was a bomb and since it was in her possession, I feel like that checklist would then become invalid. One of the steps is tell them not to evacuate the building until the police arrive to evaluate the threat. If the teacher actually thought it was a bomb, she or he would have known the severity of the level is very high. That's when you evacuate the building without touching base with the police. Now if the teacher thought it was a hoax bomb, that's a whole other story and what the teacher did was right for that day. If the teacher thought it was a hoax bomb from the beginning, then the teacher was just too dumb to actually look into what the mechanisms actually looked like.

Foster

25-09-2015, 16:16

In accordance with proper FEMA bomb threat procedure (https://emilms.fema.gov/is906/assets/ocso-bomb_threat_samepage-brochure.pdf)

And what does the FEMA bomb threat procedure have to do with this?

This page has the Student Conduct Guide for the 2015 School year (http://iisd.schoolwires.net/Page/1834) It's their rule book. Not FEMA.

There is also an adjunct guide for School Board Policys (http://irvingisd.net/BoardPolicy)

The first document is a 50 page "guide" with an ironic slogan "Where Children Come First" on it.

I'm not willing to go with the "it was a hoax bomb threat." The teacher continued to teach, she kept the clock with her and after class they went to the office. He has given a number of interviews about what happened and the flow of the day.

I have to say that the list of things you can be expelled for is pretty intense:

Discretionary Expulsion: Misconduct That May Result in Expulsion Any Location A student may be expelled for:
** Engaging in the following, no matter where it takes place:
o Conduct that contains the elements of assault under Penal Code 22.01(a)(1) in retaliation against a school employee or volunteer.
o Criminal mischief, if punishable as a felony
**Engaging in conduct that contains the elements of one of the following offenses against another student, without regard to where the conduct occurs:
o Aggravated assault.
o Sexual assault.
o Aggravated sexual assault.
o Murder.
o Capital murder.
o Criminal attempt to commit murder or capital murder.
o Aggravated robbery.
o Breach of computer security.
o Engaging in conduct relating to a false alarm or report (including a bomb threat) or a terroristic threat involving a public school.

Yikes! But again, he said it was a clock. He never called a threat in, only the teacher said that they thought it was a bomb.

But then lets look at the glossary to make sure we didn't miss anything.

Explosive weapon is any explosive or incendiary bomb, grenade, rocket, or mine and its delivery mechanism that is designed, made, or adapted for the purpose of inflicting serious bodily injury, death, or substantial property damage, or for the principal purpose of causing such a loud report as to cause undue public alarm or terror.

No, it was a clock.

False Alarm or Report occurs when a person knowingly initiates, communicates, or circulates a report of a present, past, or future bombing, fire, offense, or other emergency that he or she knows is false or baseless and tha t would ordinarily:
1. Cause action by an official or volunteer agency organized to deal with emergencies;
2. Place a person in fear of imminent serious bodily injury; or
3. Prevent or interrupt the occupation of a building, room, or place of assembly.
No, this didn't happen either. Even the teacher can't say "Place a person in fear of imminent serious bodily injury" since she stayed and finished the class.

From what we know from the news reports and what he's said on the news.
-- It wasn't a bomb threat, since they did none of the activities that would occur around a bomb threat.
-- It wasn't a "hoax bomb" threat, since there wasn't any of the activities that would be around even a "hoax bomb"

We don't know the ISD side, and my guess is that until the trial, we never will. And actually I'm going to guess that we will read in a few weeks "The ISD reached a settlement today, neither party was willing to comment".

What we can all agree on is the Irving School District, and most school districts across the U.S. have "Zero tolerance" policy's that are a flowchart to fail by dumping issues onto the police. Which we know from this case that these things rapidly spiral out of control.

To all of you that said in different words, "not a big deal": Explain to me why I'm seeing pictures of a 14 year old student in handcuffs. Explain how a "clock" gets to the point of handcuffs. Put together a story, based on what's out there in the reported news, how it got to having him in handcuffs. Don't go dumpster diving into FEMA suggested procedures or what Home Land Security or the The Worshipful Company of Clockmakers (http://www.clockmakers.org/)would do. They put a 14 year old student in handcuffs for bringing a clock to school.

Monochron

25-09-2015, 17:37

If this teacher actually thought that clock was a bomb and since it was in her possession,

AFAIK, the teacher did NOT think it was a bomb. They thought it was a hoax bomb. I talked about the implicaitons of that on the last page.

logank013

25-09-2015, 17:48

AFAIK, the teacher did NOT think it was a bomb. They thought it was a hoax bomb. I talked about the implicaitons of that on the last page.

Ok but even at that, the kid never said it was a bomb and it was dumb if her to take it that far. All it did was beep and it was in a pencil case! Of course we don't know some details but it is ridiculous on so many levels it seems from what the news covers

wireties

25-09-2015, 19:43

I have to say that the list of things you can be expelled for is pretty intense:

The student was not expelled. He was never in danger of being expelled. I've not seen this in any media stories about this incident. What are you talking about?

wireties

25-09-2015, 19:59

To all of you that said in different words, "not a big deal": Explain to me why I'm seeing pictures of a 14 year old student in handcuffs. Explain how a "clock" gets to the point of handcuffs. Put together a story, based on what's out there in the reported news, how it got to having him in handcuffs.

Student brings disassembled old alarm clock to school in a small case.
Student shows device to engineering teacher who tells him to not show it to anyone else.
"Clock" alarm goes off and student takes it out again.
English teacher confiscates the "clock", does not know what it is but that it is not a bomb.
English teacher, obeying policy and procedure, gives device to school administration.
School administration wonders why a kid brings this to school and, obeying policy and procedure, calls the police.
Police arrive and student will not answer questions, other than state it is a clock, and does not cooperate. (to me this is weird, why not open up to the police)
Police, following policy and procedure, cuff the student and take him to the station. Reminder - to be a hoax the object must only arouse the suspicion of an "authority figure", the kids intention does not matter. And nobody gets in the back of a police cruiser w/o being cuffed.
Police, following policy and procedure, decide the kid, though uncooperative, is no danger to himself or anyone else.
Police release student.

Now it may come out that student was treated poorly somewhere along the line. There may be a racist element somewhere though it is not obvious. Many students get in trouble for all kinds of weird things. But I'm betting it is just bureaucracy run amok.

Monochron

25-09-2015, 20:11

School administration wonders why a kid brings this to school and, obeying policy and procedure, calls the police.
Police arrive and student will not answer questions, other than state it is a clock, and does not cooperate. (to me this is weird, why not open up to the police)
.
.
.
But I'm betting it is just bureaucracy run amok.

Your interpretation hinges on the administration having to report the clock to the police. I won't claim to know for certain, but I don't think a Zero Tolerance policy applies to any electronics brought into a school. I think the administrators / teachers HAD to believe that Ahmed brought a hoax bomb to the school. They don't call the police for every piece of electronics brought to school.

The real question we need to be asking is why they thought he had intentionally brought a hoax bomb. And that question is much more likely to end in racism.

logank013

25-09-2015, 21:37

Student brings disassembled old alarm clock to school in a small case.
Student shows device to engineering teacher who tells him to not show it to anyone else.
"Clock" alarm goes off and student takes it out again.
English teacher confiscates the "clock", does not know what it is but that it is not a bomb.
English teacher, obeying policy and procedure, gives device to school administration.
School administration wonders why a kid brings this to school and, obeying policy and procedure, calls the police.
Police arrive and student will not answer questions, other than state it is a clock, and does not cooperate. (to me this is weird, why not open up to the police)
Police, following policy and procedure, cuff the student and take him to the station. Reminder - to be a hoax the object must only arouse the suspicion of an "authority figure", the kids intention does not matter. And nobody gets in the back of a police cruiser w/o being cuffed.
Police, following policy and procedure, decide the kid, though uncooperative, is no danger to himself or anyone else.
Police release student.

Now it may come out that student was treated poorly somewhere along the line. There may be a racist element somewhere though it is not obvious. Many students get in trouble for all kinds of weird things. But I'm betting it is just bureaucracy run amok.

And that is the own teachers fault. If you look at the red digital display, it looks EXACTLY like the red display on my clock. Plus, it had numbers on it that read the same exact time as the teachers time on their computer. Anyone who owns an alarm clock can look at the display and immediately tell it is from a clock! It doesn't look like anything else! what else is in the format of "xx:xx"? nothing in this world except something to do with time. I will blame this on the teacher 100%. Forget the wires. Some defenses say that the teacher didn't understand the wiring. You don't need to understand the wires to tell it's a clock. If everyone had some common sense, this wouldn't have happened. And every clock makes the same exact noise for the most part. If you played a sound effect of that clock's noise, 99% of America could tell you it's a clock. I'm not trying to be rude. i'm trying to figure out how a teacher can be so stupid. maybe she didn't open it. I'm not sure. The whole situation was just dumb to begin with.

wireties

26-09-2015, 05:06

Your interpretation hinges on the administration having to report the clock to the police. I won't claim to know for certain, but I don't think a Zero Tolerance policy applies to any electronics brought into a school. I think the administrators / teachers HAD to believe that Ahmed brought a hoax bomb to the school. They don't call the police for every piece of electronics brought to school.

The real question we need to be asking is why they thought he had intentionally brought a hoax bomb. And that question is much more likely to end in racism.

You are generalizing to make your point. I totally agree (whatever rules exist) should not apply to "any electronics" but it could readily apply to any "disassembled active electronics". How many students disassemble a working clock and bring it to school? I've been helping with robotics for 12 years and never seen a student do such a thing - all kinds of Arduinos and stuff brought to the meetings but never just take something apart and show it around school. I don't understand what the kid was doing nor do I assign any nefarious intent.

I'm thinking they concluded there was some tiny chance he intended for it to be a hoax. They didn't want to put their own jobs in jeopardy - bureaucrats trapped in a zero-tolerance framework. What I'm saying is they they let policy and procedure supplant common sense. It is hard to put ourselves in their position because we 1000% KNOW it was a clock.

The more I think about this I would have counseled the student to not show it around, just like his engineering teacher. But I may have kept it for him till he could pick it up on his way home - thinking some idiot may not know what this is and react poorly. 20/20 hindsight maybe...

wireties

26-09-2015, 05:11

And that is the own teachers fault.

We just cannot and should not say such things. We KNOW 1000% that it was a disassembled clock so there is no way for us to put ourselves in the English teacher's place and make blanket accusations. Put me on the spot to interpret some Shakespeare and I dare say this English teacher would think me the idiot.

teku14

27-09-2015, 17:02

I heard the clock was completely fraudulent

Monochron

27-09-2015, 18:44

You are generalizing to make your point. I totally agree (whatever rules exist) should not apply to "any electronics" but it could readily apply to any "disassembled active electronics".

I'm not generalizing, I'm assuming. I'm assuming that Zero Tolerance does not include "disassembled active electronics" because I feel like that would be too insane. I will gladly change my mind if they were required to report something like "electronics devises where PCBs and wires are visible". If it they weren't though, then your argument doesn't hold any water.

wireties

27-09-2015, 22:34

I heard the clock was completely fraudulent

It was not a "creation" (the kid did say he built it but I'm thinking he was crazy nervous) just something the student disassembled. But taking things apart to see how they work is kewl and definitely a sign of intellectual curiosity.

wireties

27-09-2015, 22:36

I will gladly change my mind if they were required to report something like "electronics devises where PCBs and wires are visible"

I'm chuckling thinking about trying to explain PCBs to an English teacher or a 50-year old principal.

FrankJ

28-09-2015, 09:07

I'm chuckling thinking about trying to explain PCBs to an English teacher or a 50-year old principal.

So the hypothetical principal would have been in high school in the 80s? Getting in the way back machine. Not only you could wear a Timex as a watch, you could own a Timex Sinclair computer. Or you could make you own computer with a PCB, soldering iron and mostly discrete components. If you where flush with cash, you could buy the original IBM PC. 8 bit architecture was old hat even then. Bill Gates was only a millionaire. Even old people had given up their slide rules for calculators. We had all that stuff back then. Do you want to play Ticktacktoe?

Please take this with the tongue in cheek that is intended :]

teku14

28-09-2015, 11:11

It was not a "creation" (the kid did say he built it but I'm thinking he was crazy nervous) just something the student disassembled. But taking things apart to see how they work is kewl and definitely a sign of intellectual curiosity.

But he kept trying to present it as his invention.

Monochron

28-09-2015, 11:32

But he kept trying to present it as his invention.

Are you sure? And if so, who cares? I have been under the impression that he followed some instructions (alla, Instructables) and used kit type parts to build it. Whichever of those is true, awesome! I wish I had had the initiative to do that at age 14.

FrankJ

28-09-2015, 12:47

But he kept trying to present it as his invention.

Realize that national media often get the details wrong. Anyway the point of the controversy is did his taking it to school merit suspension and arrest, not was it a repurposed clock or an invention. Once again selective reporting and the school not being to tell its side of the story makes it hard to tell.

logank013

28-09-2015, 13:50

But he kept trying to present it as his invention.

I keep seeing that he tried passing it off as his own invention from many secondary sources. I feel like that is probably somebody's opinion. Find that for me in a Primary source and I will believe that he tried to do that. I'm honestly not sure which sources are right... haha. they are all so different.

Lil' Lavery

28-09-2015, 14:35

Whether or not he passed it off as his "invention" or not is largely irrelevant. A student brought an engineering project he had been working on to school to show off. It doesn't matter if he invented it, used a kit, or reverse engineered an existing product. What he did should be celebrated and encouraged.

Instead he was arrested.

dna1990

28-09-2015, 15:11

I give a lot of time and investment to FIRST activities, because among other skills and experiences - I thought it was a great environment for young people to learn to think for themselves.

A lot of the replies on this thread make me question exactly that.

There is always more to these events, don't jump on the bandwagons the media lay out in front of you.

EricH

28-09-2015, 15:26

There is always more to these events, don't jump on the bandwagons the media lay out in front of you.

Or, to put it another way:

Don't believe everything you see on the Internet. (Or in print. Or that you hear from somebody.)

Foster

28-09-2015, 17:32

Or, to put it another way:

Don't believe everything you see on the Internet. (Or in print. Or that you hear from somebody.)

Yea, I'm just upset that my photoshop skills are not good enough to put hand cuffs on, remove all the gang tattoos and swap out a confederate flag on the tee shirt for a NASA logo on that student. Because we all know that is the real story.

The story has been on lots of news outlets. All of them match up pretty closely. I guess we'll need to wait and see the 2016-2017 ISD school budget and the million dollar notation.

Madison

28-09-2015, 17:48

logank013

28-09-2015, 20:59

Are you aware of additional information that hasn't been shared in this thread?

If so, what is it?

If not -- what point is there in your post?

He or she was saying that sometimes, the media takes the facts that they receive and put their own sort of twists and opinions on the story. I think their point was very valid. The facts are exactly as follows before the arresting of Ahmed. He dissembles a clock and puts it in a pencil pouch. He thinks it is cool so he takes it to school. He shows his engineering teacher and the teacher says, don't show anyone else. Ahmed shows his English teacher and she believes it to be a hoax bomb. Ahmed gets arrested.

The OP's point in their post is that all the main media outlets blame Ahmed for everything and not listening to his teacher. The media also goes out on tangents talking about things that are irrelevant, just to make the poor kid look bad.

What some users are saying on Chief Delphi is that who cares about what the media is saying. The real issue is that the police arrested a teenager for an unjust reason. Some other users on Chief Delphi are also saying does it really matter if he didn't invent the clock? The cool part about this kid is that he is experimenting with electronics and learning how to do some mountings inside of the pencil case. It's cool that he is even experimenting with technology. That is exactly what some CD users are saying.

The point of the OP's post is saying that they enjoy a new perspective on the story and are glad to see that there is some other side to the story. Don't give the OP bad reputation for this post. They were just stating that they were glad to see another side of the story and they were just stating their opinion of how cool the users of CD are. Try not to criticize every little thing that is posted on CD. After all, CD is a forum and forums are for opinions. I just know i have received bad reputation before in a similar situation as the OP and I don't want it happening to the OP. Hopefully, I didn't make this post too in depth. Thanks for reading.

Monochron

28-09-2015, 22:36

The OP's point in their post is that all the main media outlets blame Ahmed for everything and not listening to his teacher. The media also goes out on tangents talking about things that are irrelevant, just to make the poor kid look bad.

What media are you watching? I have only seen crazy sentiments like that from nutso "media" outlets or public figures like Sarah Palin. Everything I have seen on CNN, NBC, Forbes, and even some of what I have seen on Fox (though I don't see that often) has been on his side.

I think that guys point was the opposite of what you are saying. It looks like he is suggesting that our support of Ahmed might have been influenced by "misleading" sources.

wireties

28-09-2015, 23:05

Madison

28-09-2015, 23:21

That is not what happened. The English teacher passed the situation to the school administration who passed it to the police. Then the police questioned Ahmed (for too long in my opinion) and decided he was harmless. Ahmed was not arrested or charged with anything.

I think most reasonable people would describe being placed into handcuffs, fingerprinted and having a mugshot taken as being arrested.

Monochron

29-09-2015, 02:22

Ahmed shows his English teacher and she believes it to be a hoax bomb. Ahmed gets arrested.
That is not what happened. The English teacher passed the situation to the school administration who passed it to the police. Then the police questioned Ahmed (for too long in my opinion) and decided he was harmless. Ahmed was not arrested or charged with anything.

There is really no need to qualify that. It is nearly exactly what happened. The teacher is the one who made the call the confiscate the clock and bring it to administration.
And what happened to him certainly sounds (http://dictionary.law.com/Default.aspx?selected=2437) like "arrest (http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-procedure/arrest.html)" to me. And if it's not, whatever, let's stick to the important issues. Syntax is not one of them. The kid had an incredibly egregious thing happen to him. Your continued portrayal of it as simply "the police questioned him to long" is pretty insulting to him.

wireties

29-09-2015, 04:35

There is really no need to qualify that. It is nearly exactly what happened. ... Your continued portrayal of it as simply "the police questioned him to long" is pretty insulting to him.

There is every need to qualify that. You guys are throwing a teacher under the bus, accusing him/her of being racist when he/she may be just following zero tolerance procedures in order to keep his/her job. The same goes for the school administration - they passed the buck up to the police. Why is it so hard for you to imagine that this is mostly just ridiculous bureaucracy?

I have never said simply "the police questioned him too long". You added "simply" for effect. After being called by the school administration the police also have standard operating procedures. Each time I have said I thought they should not have questioned the student for so long. And many times in this tread I have said their could be a racist element but it is irresponsible to label teachers, administrators and police officers as racist without the facts.

wireties

29-09-2015, 04:42

I think most reasonable people would describe being placed into handcuffs, fingerprinted and having a mugshot taken as being arrested.

The student was detained and processed but never charged. And this was all in a juvenile facility, not real jail (though still terrifying to the student). The student's record will not show that we was arrested or charged, even as a juvenile. None of this should have happened. It is ridiculous. My point is runaway bureaucracy, zero tolerance policies and the wording of the relevant Texas law are obviously at fault. Racism may or may not be a factor and innocents should not be maligned until the facts are known.

teku14

29-09-2015, 12:02

Are you sure? And if so, who cares? I have been under the impression that he followed some instructions (alla, Instructables) and used kit type parts to build it. Whichever of those is true, awesome! I wish I had had the initiative to do that at age 14.

I'll address many of the responses I've seen here.
1. He said so himself during many recorded interviews that it was his invention. (I'm surprised our FIRST community Memebers hasn't been able to identify that he hadn't made the clock from the photo)
2. He literally opened up a clock case and spilled its innards out onto box. That's fine also I guess sure we'll applaud that as curiosity or whatever
3. If that is the case then should we encourage students the way we are Ahmed? Does every 10-14 year old (who I've seen many do remarkable things) get huge scholarship funds, internship opportunities, and a White House visit?
4. I certainly hope you didn't have the initiative to plaguerize at his age because that's exactly what he's done.

logank013

29-09-2015, 12:07

What media are you watching? I have only seen crazy sentiments like that from nutso "media" outlets or public figures like Sarah Palin. Everything I have seen on CNN, NBC, Forbes, and even some of what I have seen on Fox (though I don't see that often) has been on his side.

I think that guys point was the opposite of what you are saying. It looks like he is suggesting that our support of Ahmed might have been influenced by "misleading" sources.

I'm mostly talking about websites. Many websites are taking the main focus from his wrongful arresting to the fact he didn't invent the clock. Many sites are more concerned that he didn't invent the clock rather than the fact he got arrested. Sorry I wasn't very clear.

teku14

29-09-2015, 12:25

I'm mostly talking about websites. Many websites are taking the main focus from his wrongful arresting to the fact he didn't invent the clock. Many sites are more concerned that he didn't invent the clock rather than the fact he got arrested. Sorry I wasn't very clear.

And that makes sense because this recent development has brought the whole movement under question. It undermines his motives and make people suspicious. I was originally deeply appealed with what happened to him but after recent developments...

Monochron

29-09-2015, 12:45

There is every need to qualify that. You guys are throwing a teacher under the bus, accusing him/her of being racist when he/she may be just following zero tolerance procedures in order to keep his/her job. The same goes for the school administration - they passed the buck up to the police. Why is it so hard for you to imagine that this is mostly just ridiculous bureaucracy?
Because, like I have been saying, I do NOT believe that Zero Tolerance covers "anything that looks electronic" or some similar wording. The teacher HAD to think something was suspicious about the device. They had to suspect him of malicious intent IF (and only if) ZT policy doesn't cover "electronic 7-seg displays" or the like. No bit of Zero Tolerance documentation I have found supports that. I would honestly love for you to prove me wrong.

I have never said simply "the police questioned him too long". You added "simply" for effect.
I think you misread what I said. I was describing your wording as simple, not saying you used the word "simple".

I think it is important to note that accusing this teacher and administrator of racism in no way accuses other Texans or other adults at the school of racism. I think this goes without saying.

Monochron

29-09-2015, 12:49

I'll address many of the responses I've seen here.
1. He said so himself during many recorded interviews that it was his invention. (I'm surprised our FIRST community Memebers hasn't been able to identify that he hadn't made the clock from the photo)
2. He literally opened up a clock case and spilled its innards out onto box. That's fine also I guess sure we'll applaud that as curiosity or whatever
3. If that is the case then should we encourage students the way we are Ahmed? Does every 10-14 year old (who I've seen many do remarkable things) get huge scholarship funds, internship opportunities, and a White House visit?
4. I certainly hope you didn't have the initiative to plaguerize at his age because that's exactly what he's done.

I think you are missing the point of this issue. If a 14 year old student uses the word "invented" to describe something that they put together from a kit, or parts, or even put working parts into a new enclosure, that isn't a big deal. I have tons of students on my FIRST team that use the wrong words to describe their work (especially freshman like Ahmed). We correct them and we move on.

You should also look into how plagiarism because simply using the word "invent" does not qualify. Arguing about the use of the English language by a freshman seriously detracts from the real issues here.

wireties

29-09-2015, 13:12

Because, like I have been saying, I do NOT believe that Zero Tolerance covers "anything that looks electronic" or some similar wording. The teacher HAD to think something was suspicious about the device. They had to suspect him of malicious intent IF (and only if) ZT policy doesn't cover "electronic 7-seg displays" or the like. No bit of Zero Tolerance documentation I have found supports that. I would honestly love for you to prove me wrong.

Zero tolerance includes everything defined as a crime. In Texas it does not matter what Ahmed claimed (and you and I agree 100%, it was a clock!), the device need only "cause concern to an authority figure". All the teacher or administrator need have is a sliver of doubt about what or why and they pass the buck (up) in a CYA exercise, classic bureaucratic behavior. Note that the police did eventually decide Ahmed had no nefarious intent, that he was "harmless". Finding out why they did not release him at school will be interesting - I do not understand why we was detained.

I think it is important to note that accusing this teacher and administrator of racism in no way accuses other Texans or other adults at the school of racism. I think this goes without saying.

So without any facts you are accusing the teacher and administrator of racism? You say it goes without saying but that is not the tone in the media.

teku14

29-09-2015, 13:28

I think you are missing the point of this issue. If a 14 year old student uses the word "invented" to describe something that they put together from a kit, or parts, or even put working parts into a new enclosure, that isn't a big deal. I have tons of students on my FIRST team that use the wrong words to describe their work (especially freshman like Ahmed). We correct them and we move on.

You should also look into how plagiarism because simply using the word "invent" does not qualify. Arguing about the use of the English language by a freshman seriously detracts from the real issues here.

I understand that however nobody is addressing this head on for what it really is. Heck even the title of this thread. We all want to give him lip service and pitty; more than what he deserves. If we leave this at simply "he was a victim of stereotype", I couldn't agree any more. But going this far and giving him all this underserved credit and attention absolutely ridiculous. Sure a mild gesture to let him know that his curiosity and passion is appreciated but this? How can you justify all this lip service and attention?

Monochron

29-09-2015, 13:31

Zero tolerance includes everything defined as a crime. In Texas it does not matter what Ahmed claimed (and you and I agree 100%, it was a clock!), the device need only "cause concern to an authority figure". All the teacher or administrator need have is a sliver of doubt about what or why and they pass the buck (up) in a CYA exercise, classic bureaucratic behavior.
As I see it, there is the issue. The teacher is only required to report the clock if it caused him/her concern. AND the teacher knew that reporting it would involve the police and put Ahmed into their custody (I say this because teachers are given training in Zero Tolerance policy procedures in my area and must be intimately familiar with what to do in these situations). Ahmed's electronics project did cause the teacher concern and he/she made the call to involve the police via reporting.

From what I have read, Ahmed was forthcoming with the fact that it was a clock from the beginning. The teacher didn't believe him and was concerned by his project. The teacher distrusted Ahmed's word, and it is hard to see why the teacher would think that escalation, and thus involving the policy, was the right call to make.

So without any facts you are accusing the teacher and administrator of racism? You say it goes without saying but that is not the tone in the media.We have been discussing why it could be racism for a couple pages now, there is no need to say I have no facts. We are both presenting our deductions.
And luckily, CD is not the media, and this discussion is not about calling Texan's or other school officials racist. If that is the discussion you want, you should start another thread.

Monochron

29-09-2015, 13:36

If we leave this at simply "he was a victim of stereotype", I couldn't agree any more. But going this far and giving him all this underserved credit and attention absolutely ridiculous. Sure a mild gesture to let him know that his curiosity and passion is appreciated but this? How can you justify all this lip service and attention?

No on is suggesting that he has "earned" all the attention and gifts. Sometimes big gestures which garner large media coverage are useful for making large social change. I'm not qualified to determine what he has "earned", but I'm very glad that this story is big enough that so many people are talking about it. And all the gifts he has received act as a tangible gesture that important people/companies value this kind of spirit in young people.

It publicly changes the story from "Administrators victimize young STEM enthusiast" to "The President, Microsoft, etc. value victimized young STEM enthusiasts".

Lil' Lavery

29-09-2015, 13:52

I'll address many of the responses I've seen here.
1. He said so himself during many recorded interviews that it was his invention.
So what?

(I'm surprised our FIRST community Memebers hasn't been able to identify that he hadn't made the clock from the photo)
Why should we even be trying to?

2. He literally opened up a clock case and spilled its innards out onto box.
So what?

That's fine also I guess sure we'll applaud that as curiosity or whatever
Yes, we should applaud this type of behavior.

3. If that is the case then should we encourage students the way we are Ahmed?
Yes.

Does every 10-14 year old (who I've seen many do remarkable things) get huge scholarship funds, internship opportunities, and a White House visit?
Obviously not. But Ahmed is not just every 10-14 year old who's done a remarkable thing.
When an incident becomes a matter of public interest, then examples need to be set. Important examples about racial tolerance and encouraging STEM.

4. I certainly hope you didn't have the initiative to plaguerize at his age because that's exactly what he's done.
Nothing he did constitutes plagiarism.

And that makes sense because this recent development has brought the whole movement under question. It undermines his motives and make people suspicious. I was originally deeply appealed with what happened to him but after recent developments...
No, it doesn't. There are no "recent developments" that change anything here. Whether or not he "invented" the clock or not is irrelevant. It's a pedantic argument that has nothing to do with the larger themes of the cultural prejudices in play here (both racially and intellectually motivated).

logank013

29-09-2015, 14:08

I understand that however nobody is addressing this head on for what it really is. Heck even the title of this thread. We all want to give him lip service and pitty; more than what he deserves. If we leave this at simply "he was a victim of stereotype", I couldn't agree any more. But going this far and giving him all this underserved credit and attention absolutely ridiculous. Sure a mild gesture to let him know that his curiosity and passion is appreciated but this? How can you justify all this lip service and attention?

I feel like the biggest thing about the lip service by the people of CD is because of the bad lip service of the media. I feel like the people of the media have taken it too far calling this kid pathetic for calling his rework an invention. I feel like so of the users of CD (including my self) have take it too far giving this kid credit for exploring technology. This case shouldn't even be in the media and it wouldn't be if he never got cuffed. The initial reason for this story was that he was cuffed before being released but as usual, the public and the media have taken this case on multiple other tangents like the one we're talking about now.

FrankJ

29-09-2015, 14:16

So what?

... It's a pedantic argument that has nothing to do with the larger themes of the cultural prejudices in play here (both racially and intellectually motivated).

First let say I think the school way overreacted. Nothing i have seen in the media says Ahmed tried to pass off his clock as anything more than a clock. I will even concede that cultural bias or prejudices probably played a part, maybe a large part in the school's actions. But to make a blanket assumption that was their primary reason for their actions without knowing the whole story (and the school cannot explain their side because of privacy issues) is to be guilty of the same prejudices as the school is being accused of.

Lil' Lavery

29-09-2015, 14:35

First let say I think the school way overreacted. Nothing i have seen in the media says Ahmed tried to pass off his clock as anything more than a clock. I will even concede that cultural bias or prejudices probably played a part, maybe a large part in the school's actions. But to make a blanket assumption that was their primary reason for their actions without knowing the whole story (and the school cannot explain their side because of privacy issues) is to be guilty of the same prejudices as the school is being accused of.

To whitewash away injustices because of a lack of definitive proof only enables them to perpetuate. You would have a point in a legal setting, but this is a larger cultural setting. This isn't about condemning the school so much as holding up Ahmed as a counterpoint against the cultural prejudices. Whether or not they were the exclusive reasons that led to his detainment by the authorities is a secondary matter. The circumstances has presented an opportunity for Ahmed to be an example to encourage STEM and dismantle racial prejudices.

More to my original point of the post you quoted, fact checking whether or not his clock was an "invention" or not is entirely off point. That doesn't matter here. Encouraging curiosity, intellectualism, and STEM experimentation as cultural values is what's important. Dismantling racial prejudices is what's important. Whether or not he printed his own PCB is not important. Trying to catch him in his word choice of "invention" and fact check the clock he brought is a petty argument that has little to do with the actual issues. This tweet (https://twitter.com/TwitSheridan/status/645562997897728000) in response to Richard Dawkin's line of inquiry about the origin of the clock captures it well.

teku14

29-09-2015, 15:10

So what?

Why should we even be trying to?

So what?

Yes, we should applaud this type of behavior.

Yes.

Obviously not. But Ahmed is not just every 10-14 year old who's done a remarkable thing.
When an incident becomes a matter of public interest, then examples need to be set. Important examples about racial tolerance and encouraging STEM.

Nothing he did constitutes plagiarism.

No, it doesn't. There are no "recent developments" that change anything here. Whether or not he "invented" the clock or not is irrelevant. It's a pedantic argument that has nothing to do with the larger themes of the cultural prejudices in play here (both racially and intellectually motivated).

Being the larger theme or not the answer to that is obvious amongst us all which clearly that it was wrong to do this based racial grounds is unacceptable. There there's your "relavent" part of this discussion out of the way. Now if we get to the actual part of this discussion which IS the lip service he his getting (like the title of this thread). What if everyone walked into school with electronic guys spilled out onto case and presenting it as their own invention? I wouldn't give anymore lip service to this than "I'm glad you have an interest in STEM but you're not allowed to take credit for someone else's work". If we go by definition of plagiarism, he has presented someone else's work as his own and while that shouldn't change the overall cultural response, it certainly should be a call to tone down on the lip service. Shall we applaud everyone that begins to take credit for others work? And it's not pedantic. I don't like to take public events like these at face value. I'm going to be skeptical of his intentions when a development like this emerges on a kid that's been hailed by everyone as such a innocent child.

teku14

29-09-2015, 15:13

No on is suggesting that he has "earned" all the attention and gifts. Sometimes big gestures which garner large media coverage are useful for making large social change. I'm not qualified to determine what he has "earned", but I'm very glad that this story is big enough that so many people are talking about it. And all the gifts he has received act as a tangible gesture that important people/companies value this kind of spirit in young people.

It publicly changes the story from "Administrators victimize young STEM enthusiast" to "The President, Microsoft, etc. value victimized young STEM enthusiasts".

I understand your point. This makes a lot more sense to me.

Lil' Lavery

29-09-2015, 16:56

Being the larger theme or not the answer to that is obvious amongst us all which clearly that it was wrong to do this based racial grounds is unacceptable. There there's your "relavent" part of this discussion out of the way.
That's only the tip of the iceberg. There's a lot more of that discussion to be had. You're attempting to steer this discussion away from real issues, towards your own manufactured ones.

Now if we get to the actual part of this discussion which IS the lip service he his getting (like the title of this thread). What if everyone walked into school with electronic guys spilled out onto case and presenting it as their own invention? I wouldn't give anymore lip service to this than "I'm glad you have an interest in STEM but you're not allowed to take credit for someone else's work". If we go by definition of plagiarism, he has presented someone else's work as his own and while that shouldn't change the overall cultural response, it certainly should be a call to tone down on the lip service. Shall we applaud everyone that begins to take credit for others work? And it's not pedantic. I don't like to take public events like these at face value. I'm going to be skeptical of his intentions when a development like this emerges on a kid that's been hailed by everyone as such a innocent child.

This is pretty, and, yes, pedantic. There are no "revelations" here. He's not attempting to profit from anyone else's work. Nothing here calls his innocence into question, especially not for the supposed crimes he was detained for.

You're missing the forest for the trees. You're trying to hang him based on the word "invention," and implying accusations at him that don't even make sense. Nothing you're talking about is relevant. The "lip service" he's receiving is because he's become both a public figure and a symbol. He's receiving this "lip service" because of the unfortunate circumstances he was placed in, and how demonstrating the positive qualities he was embodying can be a vehicle for change.

Whether or not the clock was his "invention" is irrelevant. Trying to fact check it does not make you some form of enlightened mind, who can see beyond the cloud of media hype. It makes you someone hooked upon a trivial detail, trying to derail an important conversation upon that detail.

wireties

29-09-2015, 21:03

To whitewash away injustices because of a lack of definitive proof only enables them to perpetuate.
And to condemn based on conjecture dilutes the seriousness of charges of racial injustice next time around. Why not wait till the facts are in?
You would have a point in a legal setting, but this is a larger cultural setting. I'm thinking the difference might be lost on the persons and institutions being accused of racial injustices.

teku14

29-09-2015, 21:38

That's only the tip of the iceberg. There's a lot more of that discussion to be had. You're attempting to steer this discussion away from real issues, towards your own manufactured ones.

This is pretty, and, yes, pedantic. There are no "revelations" here. He's not attempting to profit from anyone else's work. Nothing here calls his innocence into question, especially not for the supposed crimes he was detained for.

You're missing the forest for the trees. You're trying to hang him based on the word "invention," and implying accusations at him that don't even make sense. Nothing you're talking about is relevant. The "lip service" he's receiving is because he's become both a public figure and a symbol. He's receiving this "lip service" because of the unfortunate circumstances he was placed in, and how demonstrating the positive qualities he was embodying can be a vehicle for change.

Whether or not the clock was his "invention" is irrelevant. Trying to fact check it does not make you some form of enlightened mind, who can see beyond the cloud of media hype. It makes you someone hooked upon a trivial detail, trying to derail an important conversation upon that detail.

How about you learn to respect an opinion? Since you are again generalizing my entire stance I will address your comments. You're making false assumptions on what I'm supposedly implying. I'm not trying to "hang" him on the word invention. I am trying to cast doubt on his persona. And how is this relevant? I don't know about your morals but I value integrity very highly and will scrutinize even the most one-sided arguments if there is any question of integrity here. Call it pedantic, pretty, or frankly whatever you may but honesty and integrity are important even for a 14-year old. If the unfortunate case of Ahmed was presented in exactly the same way minus this "minor" detail at the end, than there would be absolutely no question of the qualities he embodies. You are so hung up on the most obvious and self-explanatory part of this debate that you simply fail to see how anything else is relevant. Yes. He was unjustly cuffed and interrogated and dehumanized due to what seems like a largely racially motivated reason. But how, pray tell, are you going to keep this discussion "relevant" for long when the only thing you have to contribute is your stale old argument that "Everything you guys say is irrelevant unless you say that he was falsely dehumanized and that this was racially motivated and we should encourage all the others victimized ". We get that Please grow out of that and understand where my point of view is situated. I and others that value scientific integrity have reason to be skeptical (note I'm leaving this at skepticism and nothing more, you can imagine whatever you think I'm implying) of his character and the "positive qualities he embodies". Don't get me wrong here. This does not change anything about the movement he stands for. That still stands strong. I will encouraging curiosity, intellectualism, and STEM experimentation but I will definitely not encourage dishonesty.

I will summarize. I've agreed with you this entire time with your case of encouragement for all people for are victimized like this. You've somehow misconstrued my other point that I'm skeptical of Ahmed's character as evidence that I'm missing the underlying point. While I do make the case for this as well, you must learn to respect this opinion since integrity relates greatly to what Ahmed the student who was victimized is portrayed.

EricH

30-09-2015, 01:14

I'm not trying to "hang" him on the word invention. I am trying to cast doubt on his persona. And how is this relevant? I don't know about your morals but I value integrity very highly and will scrutinize even the most one-sided arguments if there is any question of integrity here. Call it pedantic, pretty, or frankly whatever you may but honesty and integrity are important even for a 14-year old.

Seeing as there is a question of honesty and integrity, I have one simple question. Think very carefully before you answer.

How is casting doubt on someone's persona NOT "hanging" him or her (for lack of a better term close at hand)?

Let me explain, so that you may know why I ask. If integrity is important, and honesty is important, then I believe that it it quite important to maintain the integrity and honesty--and, additionally, the reputation for such. Am I not correct? And, the tarnishing of said reputation is rather a serious matter, is it not? And, furthermore, said tarnishing could potentially lead someone towards death. (That one wasn't a question. There are known or suspected cases of that happening.) At any rate, a smeared reputation may as well be a "dead" or "hung" reputation, am I not correct?

If you said yes to at least one of those questions, then I have another question for you.

Is one word being "wrong" (whether it is or not is debatable in this case--for one thing, it could have been a misquote) worth attempting to drag someone else's reputation through the mud over?

Think very carefully about your answer. I'm not entirely sure you're going to like it. For that matter, I can't say for sure I'd like my answer either if someone asked me that question.

Folks, this discussion of 1) whether or not there was racism, 2) whether or not the teacher/school administration/police went too far, and 3) whether or not the student in question actually built the clock himself...

...Is it really worth going into what many an outsider would see as personal attacks over? I've been following this thread, making almost no comments, and honestly, that's what it seems to be going towards. Could we try to keep it away from those? Thanks a lot.

Lil' Lavery

30-09-2015, 10:08

teku14

30-09-2015, 12:44

@teku14
No, I will not "respect an opinion" that is openly trying to defame ("cast doubt on the persona") a 14 year old. Especially when that defamation only hurts the larger issue here. You claim you agree with me, yet your argument only serves to attempt to undermine the footing on which Ahmed stands.

@wireties
Fighting cultural/institutional prejudices is exactly where the real issues are. This doesn't "dilute" anything. And I certainly think the ones being "condemned" know that they aren't in a legal setting right now.

Once again you are you make the false connection that I Am undermining the movement as a whole ("the footing Ahmed stands on"). We shouldn't continue this discussion anymore if you can't comprehend how Ahmed and the larger issue can be addressed separately.

teku14

30-09-2015, 12:55

Seeing as there is a question of honesty and integrity, I have one simple question. Think very carefully before you answer.

How is casting doubt on someone's persona NOT "hanging" him or her (for lack of a better term close at hand)?

Let me explain, so that you may know why I ask. If integrity is important, and honesty is important, then I believe that it it quite important to maintain the integrity and honesty--and, additionally, the reputation for such. Am I not correct? And, the tarnishing of said reputation is rather a serious matter, is it not? And, furthermore, said tarnishing could potentially lead someone towards death. (That one wasn't a question. There are known or suspected cases of that happening.) At any rate, a smeared reputation may as well be a "dead" or "hung" reputation, am I not correct?

If you said yes to at least one of those questions, then I have another question for you.

Is one word being "wrong" (whether it is or not is debatable in this case--for one thing, it could have been a misquote) worth attempting to drag someone else's reputation through the mud over?

Think very carefully about your answer. I'm not entirely sure you're going to like it. For that matter, I can't say for sure I'd like my answer either if someone asked me that question.

Folks, this discussion of 1) whether or not there was racism, 2) whether or not the teacher/school administration/police went too far, and 3) whether or not the student in question actually built the clock himself...

...Is it really worth going into what many an outsider would see as personal attacks over? I've been following this thread, making almost no comments, and honestly, that's what it seems to be going towards. Could we try to keep it away from those? Thanks a lot.

I see your point however who's fault is it if someone plagiarizes and gets caught, defamed, and dies because of it? But you may be right in the sense that this is a kid and that I shouldn't be as harsh for this kind of thing especially given the circumstances he's In. I'm certainly not trying to "drag his reputation through the mud" which is an extremely harsh metaphor. And the one word is not wrong. He's said it multiple times in interviews but yet again you are correct about giving him this given the circumstances. However, I do reserve the right to remain skeptical of him as a person. That's my opinion.

wireties

30-09-2015, 13:20

Fighting cultural/institutional prejudices is exactly where the real issues are. This doesn't "dilute" anything. And I certainly think the ones being "condemned" know that they aren't in a legal setting right now.

You leave yourself open to charges of impugning the character of individuals, organizations, indeed entire political entities, with zero evidence. This is nearly as egregious as the assumed racial prejudice itself.

Lil' Lavery

30-09-2015, 13:55

Once again you are you make the false connection that I Am undermining the movement as a whole ("the footing Ahmed stands on"). We shouldn't continue this discussion anymore if you can't comprehend how Ahmed and the larger issue can be addressed separately.

I'll put this bluntly.
There are real issues in play, and in a thread discussing those, you chose to attack the character a 14 year old you have never met. Not only are you distracting from the issue, you're contributing to the problem at hand. You're cyber bullying a 14 year old.

Lil' Lavery

30-09-2015, 13:57

You leave yourself open to charges of impugning the character of individuals, organizations, indeed entire political entities, with zero evidence. This is nearly as egregious as the assumed racial prejudice itself.
How is holding Ahmed up as an example impugning the character of anyone? What happened to Ahmed was wrong, and stating as much needs to happen.

teku14

30-09-2015, 14:19

I'll put this bluntly.
There are real issues in play, and in a thread discussing those, you chose to attack the character a 14 year old you have never met. Not only are you distracting from the issue, you're contributing to the problem at hand. You're cyber bullying a 14 year old.

And here you are guilty of the same, blindly supporting a 14 year old that you have never met and taking all that the media has to offer at face value while still making the same stale old arguments. You're last two sentences are purely unfounded rhetoric so I will disregard them for your sake.

Madison

30-09-2015, 14:24

And here you are guilty of the same, blindly supporting a 14 year old that you have never met and taking all that the media has to offer at face value while still making the same stale old arguments. You're last two sentences are purely unfounded rhetoric so I will disregard them for your sake.

Sean's points are valid and he's trying to foster a meaningful discussion about something that's FAR more important than whether this particular person meets your bizarre standards for integrity, etc.

Sean wants to talk about institutional racism and anti-intellectualism. You want to whine about a single individual. While they are subjects that certainly can be addressed separately as you've suggested, your piece of this discussion -- going after a kid -- is a worthless waste of your time and ours.

Jacob Bendicksen

30-09-2015, 14:40

teku14

30-09-2015, 14:42

Sean's points are valid and he's trying to foster a meaningful discussion about something that's FAR more important than whether this particular person meets your bizarre standards for integrity, etc.

Sean wants to talk about institutional racism and anti-intellectualism. You want to whine about a single individual. While they are subjects that certainly can be addressed separately as you've suggested, your piece of this discussion -- going after a kid -- is a worthless waste of your time and ours.

I'm sorry that you feel that way about what I have to say. However, just because you say so (with disrespectfully strong language), does not make this any less important. While I agree that about the priority of institutional racism and anti-intellectualism over what my 2 cents were to this, I truly have no other motive here than to add another dimension to this topic. I'm not out defame this kid, drag his reputation through the mud or any of the other strong metaphors that people are accusing me of. In fact, most of what I've said here is an opinion of mine that Sean has such a strong desire scrutinize. The only kid that you, or anyone else in this conversation is after is me and my opinion. So if you truly want to stop wasting my time and yours how about you actually start talking about this larger issue instead of having away at me, lip service toward Ahmed, and my opinion of Ahmed as a person

Bob Steele

30-09-2015, 14:43

Does anyone really know whether "insert generic white Christian name here" would have been treated differently in this case? Was it the device or social injustice? Is it the media that jumped to a conclusion? These are tough questions to figure out.

I think that someone should have looked at the device/clock that this young man had and figured out it was not a bomb. Unfortunately, there are few individuals that would be able to do that. I know that after the fact it is easy to see that this was not a bomb.

If YOU were the teacher or staff member and you saw something like this how would YOU have reacted? Remember that if it had been an explosive device and it went off how would you have felt then?

I know many teachers who would have reacted the same way. Students bring in all sorts of things that aren't part of their classes. Including weapons, toys, and things I can't really talk about here. They don't belong at school. I have worked at schools (not my present one) where i have had to disarm individuals. I did not do that based on what they looked like. I did it based on the weapon.

Now Ahmed didn't have a weapon... but do we err on the side of caution when the circumstances dictate that? I have seen students with squirt guns (that looked amazing like real guns) cuffed and led away at school. How does one know?

Ahmed bears a little of this responsibility by just deciding to "make" this clock/device and bring it to school. While I applaud any attempt at deciphering the technological world around us and I love his curiosity about NASA and science, in retrospect he should have asked permission to bring it in and made sure everyone at school knew it was coming in order to not elicit the type of response that he got.

I am not knowledgeable enough about Ahmed or his family or the school or anything else to comment on his motives for doing this so I won't.

I believe it was the "device" that caused the reaction and not the color of Ahmed's skin or his name or religion.

People, in general, are afraid of technology because they don't understand it. They are encumbered by media reports of strange technological devices because for the most part, the media does not understand it either. Fictional programs have prop devices that are shown on screen giving the viewer a "taste" of what a real device looks like.

I know that this has probably happened at many schools all over the world.
A student brings something in to school.... it looks strange.... it is necessary to think the worst and act accordingly until it is proven safe. This is a totally necessary response to protect our students.

I am sorry for any student that gets caught up with something like this but it needs to be a learning experience. When the truth comes out, we move on.

move on... invite Ahmed to a team... give him a good place to exercise his curiosity and passion for technology....

move along... this is not the droid you are looking for....

teku14

30-09-2015, 14:50

I can't speak for Sean, but I'd rather support someone I'd never met than put them down. I'd like to think that people are good unless proven otherwise.

I'm sorry... I was of the same opinion as well but after these reports. And I'm not trying to put him down. I have a different view. Maybe it's just me (as is evident by most other responses) that I become this skeptical when evidence of dishonesty surfaces.

Lil' Lavery

30-09-2015, 14:51

I'm sorry that you feel that way about what I have to say. However, just because you say so (with disrespectfully strong language), does not make this any less important. While I agree that about the priority of institutional racism and anti-intellectualism over what my 2 cents were to this, I truly have no other motive here than to add another dimension to this topic. I'm not out defame this kid, drag his reputation through the mud or any of the other strong metaphors that people are accusing me of. In fact, most of what I've said here is an opinion of mine that Sean has such a strong desire scrutinize. The only kid that you, or anyone else in this conversation is after is me and my opinion. So if you truly want to stop wasting my time and yours how about you actually start talking about this larger issue instead of having away at me, lip service toward Ahmed, and my opinion of Ahmed as a person

Seeing as you have never met nor interacted with Ahmed, your opinion of him carries no weight. Your directly stated your objective as to "cast doubt on his persona," and your actions in this thread have backed that up. That's defaming someone. That's dragging someone through the mud. Most importantly, that's contributing to the type of anti-intellectualism that led to this issue. Instead of celebrating youth that are interested in science and technology, you are lashing out at Ahmed.

Monochron

30-09-2015, 15:00

I truly have no other motive here than to add another dimension to this topic.
If that is really all you want to do, then you are done. You gave your opinion that him claiming to have "invented" it instead of having "assembled" (or whatever) it means that we should think less of him than the media wants. No one has agreed with you so far. That will happen in life, but there is nothing more to discuss.

The only kid that you, or anyone else in this conversation is after is me and my opinion.
I'll respond to this part because I think this is an important part of the conversation for everyone to understand.
YES, we are after you and your opinion. We are doing so because we find you opinion to be poorly based, unjust, and simply bad. I'm not particularly fond of the "you must respect everone's opinion" because I believe (and I would wager that Sean and Madison agree) that your opinion is a poisonous one. For the reasons presented in our discussion already, I recommend that you take some time, reconsider, and think about dropping that opinion.

FrankJ

30-09-2015, 15:11

Sean's points are valid and he's trying to foster a meaningful discussion about something that's FAR more important than whether this particular person meets your bizarre standards for integrity, etc.

Sean wants to talk about institutional racism and anti-intellectualism. You want to whine about a single individual. While they are subjects that certainly can be addressed separately as you've suggested, your piece of this discussion -- going after a kid -- is a worthless waste of your time and ours.

The big assumption here is what happened to Ahmed is based on institutional racism. It might well be but nobody has presented any proof. Schools over react & over discipline frequently for reasons other than institutional racism. Ahmed jokingly telling a friend he was going to blow up the school moves the school's reaction to just overreaching. This is hypothetical; no disrespect to Ahmed is intended.

If the response is just to prove we are not all racist then it is a little silly. (not directed at Sean or you) If it is to have a meaningful discussion on how to overcome remaining vestiges of discrimination great. Either way it seems that Ahmed is becoming a symbol & the actual facts are unimportant. "When the legend becomes the fact, print the legend" Maxwell Scott

teku14

30-09-2015, 15:12

If that is really all you want to do, then you are done. You gave your opinion that him claiming to have "invented" it instead of having "assembled" (or whatever) it means that we should think less of him than the media wants. No one has agreed with you so far. That will happen in life, but there is nothing more to discuss.

I'll respond to this part because I think this is an important part of the conversation for everyone to understand.
YES, we are after you and your opinion. We are doing so because we find you opinion to be poorly based, unjust, and simply bad. I'm not particularly fond of the "you must respect everone's opinion" because I believe (and I would wager that Sean and Madison agree) that your opinion is a poisonous one. For the reasons presented in our discussion already, I recommend that you take some time, reconsider, and think about dropping that opinion.

Thank you for that summation. I wished that I could have been done with this a while ago but yes that is my opinion and if that's the consensus of the majority (very apparent that it is) for me to stop arguing this opinion then I will do so. I was only being defensive to that opinion.

While I disagree with you on this opinion being any of the 3 you listed above and believe it is very important to the discussion, I recognize the desire by everyone else to not have this kind of opinion present. I've thought about this many times but I stand firm by my opinion.

Madison

30-09-2015, 15:33

The big assumption here is what happened to Ahmed is based on institutional racism. It might well be but nobody has presented any proof. Schools over react & over discipline frequently for reasons other than institutional racism. Ahmed jokingly telling a friend he was going to blow up the school moves the school's reaction to just overreaching. This is hypothetical; no disrespect to Ahmed is intended.

If the response is just to prove we are not all racist then it is a little silly. (not directed at Sean or you) If it is to have a meaningful discussion on how to overcome remaining vestiges of discrimination great. Either way it seems that Ahmed is becoming a symbol & the actual facts are unimportant. "When the legend becomes the fact, print the legend" Maxwell Scott

Exposing the effects of institutional racism can be very difficult. Even in the absence of definitive proof that those involved in this case were motivated by racism, the possibility itself offers an opportunity for us to discuss problems that need to be solved (and, I'd argue, are not mere vestiges of our checkered past).

In this case, I don't think you need proof of some overt action taken by the teacher, administration, or police; rather, the lack of similar incidents of this kind of perceived overreaction -- notably involving students who are not minorities -- seems to point toward Ahmed's race and religion playing some part in how he was treated.

GKrotkov

30-09-2015, 15:41

Exposing the effects of institutional racism can be very difficult. Even in the absence of definitive proof that those involved in this case were motivated by racism, the possibility itself offers an opportunity for us to discuss problems that need to be solved (and, I'd argue, are not mere vestiges of our checkered past).

In this case, I don't think you need proof of some overt action taken by the teacher, administration, or police; rather, the lack of similar incidents of this kind of perceived overreaction -- notably involving students who are not minorities -- seems to point toward Ahmed's race and religion playing some part in how he was treated.

I'd like to point out that the Supreme Court of the United States agrees with this point:
http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/texas-department-of-housing-and-community-affairs-v-the-inclusive-communities-project-inc/

http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/14pdf/13-1371_m64o.pdf

For those of us who don't like wading through legal discussion, SCOTUS essentially said that proportional inequality is an acceptable demonstration of large-scale discrimination.

Edit:
...But, as Sean pointed out, this is a cultural, rather than a legal, discussion. Perhaps then take it with a grain of salt.

FrankJ

30-09-2015, 17:00

Exposing the effects of institutional racism can be very difficult. Even in the absence of definitive proof that those involved in this case were motivated by racism, the possibility itself offers an opportunity for us to discuss problems that need to be solved (and, I'd argue, are not mere vestiges of our checkered past).

In this case, I don't think you need proof of some overt action taken by the teacher, administration, or police; rather, the lack of similar incidents of this kind of perceived overreaction -- notably involving students who are not minorities -- seems to point toward Ahmed's race and religion playing some part in how he was treated.

I am all for discussing these problems with the desire for finding constructive solutions. I am happy that most of the mainstream national reaction was to defend Ahmed. If i was local to the school district, I would asking my elected officials for an explanation and the problem to be addressed.

Do we know the school's history of suspensions & referring youth to police? Without that you cannot claim proportional inequality is at play here. Nationally I can site examples of zero tolerance run amock without depending on institutional racism as a cause.

Monochron

30-09-2015, 18:41

While I disagree with you on this opinion being any of the 3 you listed above and believe it is very important to the discussion, I recognize the desire by everyone else to not have this kind of opinion present. I've thought about this many times but I stand firm by my opinion.

That's a mature way to deal with this disagreement. I'm glad we could agree to disagree.

wireties

30-09-2015, 19:05

How is holding Ahmed up as an example impugning the character of anyone? What happened to Ahmed was wrong, and stating as much needs to happen.

What happened to Ahmed is wrong, wrong, wrong! 100% agreement! Blaming it solely (or partially) on racial injustice (as you earlier stated) is just as wrong (sans facts).

Lil' Lavery

30-09-2015, 20:02

If the school honestly feared it may be a bomb, they would have evacuated and called the bomb squad. That's what happens when you take a "zero tolerance" approach.

What happened to Ahmed is wrong, wrong, wrong! 100% agreement! Blaming it solely (or partially) on racial injustice (as you earlier stated) is just as wrong (sans facts).

As an aside, I'll remind you this is the town that passed an "anti-Shariah law" (http://www.dallasnews.com/news/metro/20150319-dispute-on-islam-roils-irving.ece) back in March.

But in reality, you're missing the forest for the trees here. Whether or not the individuals involved were impacted by racial prejudices, Ahmed has become a symbol about fighting against institutional and cultural racism. A few minutes of searching comments sections about this incident yielded these (http://i.imgur.com/LytwbLU.jpg). There are articles out there about the link between engineering (http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2009/12/buildabomber.html) and terrorism (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/12/magazine/12FOB-IdeaLab-t.html?_r=0). There is little doubt that institutional racism exists in the United States (and some painful parallels with Ahmed being "detained" while not "arrested"). Given this, it's important to use this as an example for good. Ahmed has power as a symbol. Even Ahmed knows as much.
“It’s worth it, once you realize what you’re fighting for,” he said. (http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/sep/17/ahmed-mohamed-is-tired-excited-to-meet-obama-and-wants-his-clock-back)

wireties

30-09-2015, 20:37

As an aside, I'll remind you this is the town that passed an "anti-Shariah law" (http://www.dallasnews.com/news/metro/20150319-dispute-on-islam-roils-irving.ece) back in March.

And? Is this yet another veiled accusation/inference? So who is on your "racial injustice perpetrator list"? Teacher, school, district, town, Texas?

But in reality, you're missing the forest for the trees here.

This is the USA. Metaphorical trees matter.

I'm all for using Ahmed as an example or a cause if and when the facts are in. And they most certainly are not.

Lil' Lavery

30-09-2015, 20:46

wireties

30-09-2015, 21:56

Ahmed was wrongly detained.
Ahmed is a student interested in engineering.
Ahmed is of a race that suffers institutional and cultural prejudices against it.

Those are the facts that matter. That's enough to justify the use of Ahmed as a symbol, and Ahmed accepts that.

Wrong - a key fact is missing. Was Ahmed wrongly detained BECAUSE of his race and/or culture? This is the key unknown factoid. By choosing Ahmed you are focusing public ire on persons and groups that may or may not deserve it. Also if there is something negative we do not know one risks damaging the cause and Ahmed. People will tune this kind of thing out - they already are. How many cause celebres have there been lately that turned out to be something different? Answer - too many.

Why not pick another symbol? There are plenty of documented possibilities.

logank013

30-09-2015, 22:24

Wrong - a key fact is missing. Was Ahmed wrongly detained BECAUSE of his race and/or culture? This is the key unknown factoid. By choosing Ahmed you are focusing public ire on persons and groups that may or may not deserve it. Also if there is something negative we do not know one risks damaging the cause and Ahmed. People will tune this kind of thing out - they already are. How many cause celebres have there been lately that turned out to be something different? Answer - too many.

Why not pick another symbol? There are plenty of documented possibilities.

At this point, race has nothing to did with our side of the argument. No matter what race he is, it was all on the teacher and admin for thinking it was a hoax bomb. As media reports, Ahmed never stated it was a bomb at all. He called it his clock (or "invention" (which we all know is not)) from the get go. Let's throw out the race card. Assuming the was no racial prejudice, it still leaves that he was wrongly detained for what he called a clock from the start. That is the real issue. I love police. They were just doing their job when the school contacted them. This issue, in my humble opinion, lies on why the teacher and admin believed it to be a hoax bomb to begin with. Even without knowledge of wiring, it should be obvious by the red display it is the insides of a clock. The whole why the teacher and admin thought it was a hoax bomb thing is something I'll probably never understand.

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 01:10

Wrong - a key fact is missing. Was Ahmed wrongly detained BECAUSE of his race and/or culture? This is the key unknown factoid. By choosing Ahmed you are focusing public ire on persons and groups that may or may not deserve it. Also if there is something negative we do not know one risks damaging the cause and Ahmed. People will tune this kind of thing out - they already are. How many cause celebres have there been lately that turned out to be something different? Answer - too many.

Why not pick another symbol? There are plenty of documented possibilities.

You don't have to be persecuted for your race to be held as a example of a American Muslim student interested in science and technology.

Symbols aren't something people "deserve." Symbols come from an opportunity. This is an opportunity to turn an awful event that happened into Ahmed into something positive for the American Muslim community, and the country in general. There is the right mix of public attention, social media buzz, and general media attention to allow for his moment to be used to influence things positively.

wireties

01-10-2015, 07:14

You don't have to be persecuted for your race to be held as a example of a American Muslim student interested in science and technology.

Symbols aren't something people "deserve." Symbols come from an opportunity. This is an opportunity to turn an awful event that happened into Ahmed into something positive for the American Muslim community, and the country in general. There is the right mix of public attention, social media buzz, and general media attention to allow for his moment to be used to influence things positively.

"Deserve" applies to the persons, organizations and townships you were accusing of racial injustice, not the "symbol". Your last several posts have not mentioned racial injustice. So if we are, for some reason, in need of a symbol to advocate for technology savvy teenage American Muslims then Ahmed works.

wireties

01-10-2015, 07:22

At this point, race has nothing to did with our side of the argument. No matter what race he is, it was all on the teacher and admin for thinking it was a hoax bomb.

It was a clock! We know that. Ahmed's engineering teacher knew it was a clock. But should we expect the same of an English teacher? As I've stated for several times, it does not matter what Ahmed thought or what he claimed to any party involved. To be a hoax under Texas law the device need only "cause concern to an authority figure". The teacher and school administration had enough doubt to pass the decision to the police who decided it was not a hoax and that Ahmed was harmless. We do not know if anyone involved stated under oath they thought the device was an intentional hoax. They were confused and/or passing the buck and/or following zero tolerance policies. We do not know why the police detained Ahmed. Some sort of profiling could be a factor but we do not know that. Not yet.

Basel A

01-10-2015, 08:16

Wrong - a key fact is missing. Was Ahmed wrongly detained BECAUSE of his race and/or culture?

If you're waiting for the police department to release a statement stating that they are racist and discriminate against brown people, I think you'll be waiting a very long time. Otherwise, I'm not sure what additional evidence you're looking for. There's every indication that the town as a whole is very Islamophobic and the treatment Ahmed receiving was far above and beyond what is reasonable or what they police "had to do" for "standard operating procedures." That's enough for me, that's enough for almost everybody in this thread, and that's enough for the White House, Facebook, Microsoft, etc., etc., etc.

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 09:40

"Deserve" applies to the persons, organizations and townships you were accusing of racial injustice, not the "symbol". Your last several posts have not mentioned racial injustice. So if we are, for some reason, in need of a symbol to advocate for technology savvy teenage American Muslims then Ahmed works.

We have the need to advocate for a technology savvy teenage American Muslim because of racial injustice.

We're never going to have definitive proof either way regarding the precise motivations of the individuals who detained Ahmed. That doesn't mean we can't take positive action. Nobody here is arguing those individuals be held accountable for those actions. What we're doing instead is taking a negative event and attempting to use it for positive gains.

It was a clock! We know that. Ahmed's engineering teacher knew it was a clock. But should we expect the same of an English teacher? As I've stated for several times, it does not matter what Ahmed thought or what he claimed to any party involved. To be a hoax under Texas law the device need only "cause concern to an authority figure". The teacher and school administration had enough doubt to pass the decision to the police who decided it was not a hoax and that Ahmed was harmless. We do not know if anyone involved stated under oath they thought the device was an intentional hoax. They were confused and/or passing the buck and/or following zero tolerance policies. We do not know why the police detained Ahmed. Some sort of profiling could be a factor but we do not know that. Not yet.

Once again, if anyone truly feared it was a bomb or they blindly followed a "zero tolerance" policy that was in place, they would have evacuated the school and called the bomb squad.

Monochron

01-10-2015, 12:28

Once again, if anyone truly feared it was a bomb or they blindly followed a "zero tolerance" policy that was in place, they would have evacuated the school and called the bomb squad.
Technically, the school employees thought it was a "hoax bomb", not a real bomb. It is still a criminal act to bring a hoax bomb to a school but they wouldn't have evacuated. Why they thought it was a hoax bomb is the big unknown:

The whole "why the teacher and admin thought it was a hoax bomb" thing is something I'll probably never understand.
It may well have been, and it is my opinion that it was, racist tendencies that made them think Ahmed was more likely to have brought in a fake bomb than he was to have brought in a clock. This is likely something that we will never know for certain via any kind of statement or facts.

wireties

01-10-2015, 16:23

If you're waiting for the police department to release a statement stating that they are racist and discriminate against brown people, I think you'll be waiting a very long time.

Ahmed's father is a lawyer. He'll sue. Everything will come out during discovery. Otherwise there is no evidence this is racially motivated - none.

wireties

01-10-2015, 16:25

There's every indication that the town as a whole is very Islamophobic ...

Really, and your evidence is what? That the mayor is a goofball? That they passed a law to make sure Sharia did not supplant constitutional law? (and before you ask why they did it there was a sharia court operating in the town)

Why would you make such a unwise generalization?

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 16:30

Really, and your evidence is what? That the mayor is a goofball? That they passed a law to make sure Sharia did not supplant constitutional law? (and before you ask why they did it there was a sharia court operating in the town)

Why would you make such a unwise generalization?

http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2015/jul/16/chain-email/chain-email-muslims-tried-open-nations-first-shari/

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/shariatexas.asp

wireties

01-10-2015, 17:07

http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2015/jul/16/chain-email/chain-email-muslims-tried-open-nations-first-shari/

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/shariatexas.asp

I don't really have an opinion and do not know much about sharia. But this seems political, not cultural. We can't have two parallel systems of justice especially if one is not known for promoting the rights of women.

jee7s

01-10-2015, 17:13

http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2015/jul/16/chain-email/chain-email-muslims-tried-open-nations-first-shari/

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/shariatexas.asp

So, the mayor and city council of a town passing a resolution to support a bill in the Texas Legislature that is within the legislature's authority (cf. Texas Constitution re: Courts) makes the town Islamophobic? I am confused.

By the way, Irving is a nice town. The Dallas Regional is held there. Office Space was shot there. Wonderful people that I've had the pleasure to be around several times in the past years.

wireties

01-10-2015, 17:32

http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2015/jul/16/chain-email/chain-email-muslims-tried-open-nations-first-shari/

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/shariatexas.asp

Looks like Ontario and England might draw Lavery's ire also...

https://web.stanford.edu/group/sjir/pdf/Sharia_11.2.pdf

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 17:41

Those articles weren't calling Irving Islamaphobic. They were disproving the false claim that there was a Sharia court in Irving.

I don't really have an opinion and do not know much about sharia. But this seems political, not cultural. We can't have two parallel systems of justice especially if one is not known for promoting the rights of women.

It wasn't a "parallel justice system." It wasn't a Sharia Court. For all intents and purposes, it was a conflict mediator/arbitrator. There are similar services provided by Christian, Jewish, and non-religious groups.

And unless you're prepared to get into a PM debate regarding the treatment of women by other faiths, spare me your Islamaphobia regarding women's rights.

wireties

01-10-2015, 17:56

Those articles weren't calling Irving Islamaphobic.

Hey - you posted them in a response to a request for evidence Irving was racially and/or culturally biased. Check the mirror.

And unless you're prepared to get into a PM debate regarding the treatment of women by other faiths, spare me your Islamaphobia regarding women's rights.

I am fully prepared and you will not fair well. So now I am Islamaphobic? Is this your modus operandi - every person who disagrees with you is -ist or -phobic. Wow.

Madison

01-10-2015, 18:12

(and before you ask why they did it there was a sharia court operating in the town)

http://www.politifact.com/texas/statements/2015/jul/16/chain-email/chain-email-muslims-tried-open-nations-first-shari/

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/shariatexas.asp

It's pretty clear that Sean provided those links to demonstrate that your assertion that there was a sharia court operating in Irving was not true.

wireties

01-10-2015, 18:23

It's pretty clear that Sean provided those links to demonstrate that your assertion that there was a sharia court operating in Irving was not true.

A community-promoted arbitration mechanism, enforced by the a local cultural hierarchy, might as well be a court. It certainly can be to the young women trapped in the mechanisms. I refer you to the article I linked above.

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 18:42

Hey - you posted them in a response to a request for evidence Irving was racially and/or culturally biased. Check the mirror.
Madison already posted the relevant portion. I posted two fact-checking sites in response to your comment regarding the presence of a Sharia Court in Irving, even without stripping it down to the barest portion of the quote as Madison did, the context should be obvious enough.

I am fully prepared and you will not fair well. So now I am Islamaphobic? Is this your modus operandi - every person who disagrees with you is -ist or -phobic. Wow.

From now on, I suggest we take it to PMs. This is obvious not constructive. However, since you have accused this of being my "modus operandi" (and I would think you would have seen that elsewhere if that was my modus operandi), I feel the need to make this response public.

Your comment espoused a targeted negative stereotype only related to this thread's subject by the narrowest of tangents. That stereotype was, by your own admission, based out of ignorance ("I don't know much about Sharia law"). That comment was Islamaphobic.

You and I seem to have a fundamental disconnect regarding Islamaphobia and racial prejudices. Stating an action is Islamaphobic is not an attack on someone's character. Stating that our culture is prejudiced against Muslims in a fashion that led to the detainment and suspension of Ahmed is not an attack on the individuals who detained and suspended Ahmed. What it's doing is identifying an action that is based on ignorance or misunderstandings. It's attempting to correct a negative behavior. It doesn't mean that you're a bad person, simply that a mistake has been committed. Given the cultural prejudices in play here, it's important that incidents like these not be allowed to perpetuate, but rather be brought up. It's why it's important to raise Ahmed up as a symbol. If you wish to discuss women's rights in Islam, we can do so via PM rather than drag this thread further off course.

wireties

01-10-2015, 18:50

Your comment espoused a targeted negative stereotype only related to this thread's subject by the narrowest of tangents. That stereotype was, by your own admission, based out of ignorance ("I don't know much about Sharia law"). That comment was Islamaphobic.

You took this this thread down this road. The "tangent" is directly relevant. You started out accusing persons, schools, organizations and townships of "racial injustice". I may not "know much about Sharia law" but I know more than you. How much time have you spent in places where sharia is the law?

I am not Islamaphobic and I never have been. Just because you state something, in ignorance, does not make it true.

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 18:56

You and I seem to have a fundamental disconnect regarding Islamaphobia and racial prejudices. Stating an action is Islamaphobic is not an attack on someone's character. Stating that our culture is prejudiced against Muslims in a fashion that led to the detainment and suspension of Ahmed is not an attack on the individuals who detained and suspended Ahmed. What it's doing is identifying an action that is based on ignorance or misunderstandings. It's attempting to correct a negative behavior. It doesn't mean that you're a bad person, simply that a mistake has been committed. Given the cultural prejudices in play here, it's important that incidents like these not be allowed to perpetuate, but rather be brought up. It's why it's important to raise Ahmed up as a symbol. If you wish to discuss women's rights in Islam, we can do so via PM rather than drag this thread further off course.

Since this needs to be reinforced.

wireties

01-10-2015, 19:01

Since this needs to be reinforced.

The young persons following this thread need to know that casting wide nets alleging horrible -ist and -phobic things is unacceptable. There is no shortage of fact-ridden scenarios to make worthy points. This Ahmed situation is, at least today, not one of them. If it turns out racial prejudice or cultural profiling is involved then let the responsible parties have it with both proverbial barrels. But that is not yet the case, not today.

Lil' Lavery

01-10-2015, 19:02

Mods, can you close this thread or delete posts that should be taken to PM. This is not a productive conversation.

teku14

01-10-2015, 19:34

Hey - you posted them in a response to a request for evidence Irving was racially and/or culturally biased. Check the mirror.

I am fully prepared and you will not fair well. So now I am Islamaphobic? Is this your modus operandi - every person who disagrees with you is -ist or -phobic. Wow.

He even called me a cyber bully... go figure...

teku14

01-10-2015, 19:36

Mods, can you close this thread or delete posts that should be taken to PM. This is not a productive conversation.

Agreed

EricH

01-10-2015, 20:36

He even called me a cyber bully... go figure...

All I'm going to say can be summed up by the following statements--and it's a measure of how far offtrack the thread has been that none of them actually reference the original topic in any way, shape, or form:
1) Putting words in someone else's mouth is generally frowned on. (Applies to everybody, not just the quoted post--but quoted post is primary subject here.)
2) I'm pretty sure that whatever else was being discussed, the majority of folks reading the thread (that WEREN'T turned away by certain folks having a mostly one-on-one discussion) would have been in agreement had something like that actually been expressed. (Reference to discussion referenced by quoted post.)
3) I second/third/whatever-this-is the request to close/delete. I wouldn't mind seeing anything after about page 7 deleted, as that's when the thread went way offtrack. (Yep, that's right, half the thread or so.)

FrankJ

02-10-2015, 10:18

The other option is to stop restating positions & the thread will die a natural death. I am not a moderator so I don't have a say, but I am not a fan of locking threads unless they are spam or personal attacks.

Jared Russell

02-10-2015, 11:22

If you're waiting for the police department to release a statement stating that they are racist and discriminate against brown people, I think you'll be waiting a very long time.

QFT.

As engineers, we love when we can measure and quantify things. Discrimination and bias is _very_ difficult to objectively judge except in the aggregate. This is partially because those who perpetrate discriminatory practices are unconscious that they are doing so...and also because in many cases, it is too easy to plausibly deny that any discrimination has occurred absent an extensive third party investigation (and even then, most of the evidence often winds up being circumstantial). If you examine 100 individual cases of suspected institutional discrimination, you probably end up being unable to prove wrongdoing in 90 of them. But clearly the macro effects of discrimination are present at a greater scale than if you assume institutional innocence in all disputed cases.

In light of this challenge, celebrating the positive aspects of this story (Ahmad's interest in STEM) while not specifically scapegoating his district, his community, Texas, etc., is as good an outcome as we could have hoped for. Besides, blaming racism on an individual, a town, or a state is extremely lazy and naive.