12 September 2011

Shocked & Angry

The peace and hope I felt yesterday was short lived.

I was perusing Facebook today and came across a post by a college friend of mine, describing an experience of another college friend of ours.

Please read it.

First off...I am so glad she is ok. That she is safe is the only good thing I can find in this story.

It saddens me, this type of thing. That we have so lost control of our perspective that we find mundane things "suspicious" just because someone looks like they may be of a different ethnicity (even if they are American citizens, born & raised here); that these same citizens can be held without being told why, then humiliated with strip searches and further held JUST BECAUSE THEY LOOK DIFFERENT...well, it sickens me.

I get that there are bad people out there. I also know they come in all shapes and sizes. While the terrorists that hit on 11 September were middle eastern, Timothy McVeigh, also a terrorist, was white. This type of profiling proves that the terrorists are still winning, that we are still in a state of constant and often ridiculous fear.

Reading this story felt much like the book Zeitoun, and I was compelled to share. It is easy to distance ourselves from this problem, from the racial profiling that goes on every day, all around us (generalizing groups as terrorists, or illegal immigrants, or thieves just because of how they look)...stories like this remind us that there is a real human element behind these generalizations, and how easy it is to lose grasp on reality.

Peace be with you, Shosh. And thank you for sharing your story.

1 comment:

Pernilla said...

Oh my god. That is really all I can say. It's so unbelievable. And shocking.