Ahmed Mohamed has been in the news constantly this past week, and for good reason. After the whole clock incident there's of course been a lot of outrage. And now various important people have been coming out to show their support for him -- Obama invited him to the White House, and today Microsoft gave him a bunch of goodies. This is fine. I'm happy for him!
BUT...
I feel like this is just all a big distraction from the actual issue at hand here. By focusing so much on Ahmed and how people are fixing Ahmed's situation, we're ignoring everyone else that racism affects. I don't know, I just feel like people will be satisfied by seeing Ahmed happy and whatever that they'll forget about the systemic problems and nothing will change.
And all of these big companies/people coming out and giving him grand gestures just feels like phony self-promotion. ("Look at us! We're not racist, we gave that brown kid a computer! Apple didn't do that!") The whole thing has sort of left a bad taste in my mouth and I feel like everyone is going to forget about the issue until the next time this inevitably happens.
Hubski, what do you think about this whole situation?
So how do you feel about Aylan Kurdi? I'll bet you didn't know that as of April, there were 310,000 dead because of the Syrian civil war. Did you know that 20,000 refugees flow into Germany every day? 'member this? That was 18 months ago. But the right photo, at the right time, and suddenly: Angela Merkel announced that Germany would take 3m refugees per year, indefinitely, and that didn't happen until Aylan Kurdi. We've been treating muslims like shit since the first time Khalid Sheikh Mohammed tried to blow up the WTC (1993 - I'll bet you'd forgotten) and if we've maybe finally gotten to the point where we feel bad about it, I'm glad we could do it over a kid that's still alive. EDIT: I knew that number was wrong. It's 500k refugees per year, which if were equivalent in the US, would be 2m.
That video is heartbreaking. I am going to send it to my Mom. I talked to my her the other night for three hours. She was diving home, from her new traveling nurse job. We got passed the point, where she ran out of things to complain about work. This takes about an hour and a half. After that we start talking about politics, and a miracle happens. "So what is going on with all these refugees? I don't understand it." This was my chance, I couldn't blow it. I try to break down the situation, in a way that she can follow. This is not my strong suit, but she is used to it, and listens until I get to the 1970's. She tells me a few antecedents of cultures clashing in the ER, and the school where she was a nurse. I listen, in return. She asks me to bring in the book I mentioned, Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins, to her second job that afternoon. She is bored, and lonely for her dogs, at her hotel room. She wants to read some books, before she starts her Nurse Practitioners program. I set up the rapid ereader Spritz on her phone. She thinks of herself very differently, than when we used to clash about politics, growing up. She does science everyday, trying to help figure out what is wrong with people. She respects what I have to say, because I respect her now. I never thought we would see eye to eye. I tried, and it worked for once. She is very professional at work, but more empathy, and understanding could help her patients through the toughest times.
The book has a nice sleuthing pace. I have more success getting people to read it, than most. Factually it is a great explination of how the US stunts democracy, and prosperity everywhere else. The conflicts tend to compound with time. I prefer to read books to the news. The news is too upsetting, and confusing. Books are more rational, and I understand the news better afterwards. If I pay as much attention to the news as I would like, I tend to break.
Yup, but I unschooled her into trying. She told me she didn't really disagree with me, as a kid, just didn't understand. What she was mad about was I treated them like the were stupid. My step dad is kinda slow, and sensitive to that. I was also quite particularly strange.
I agree with you. I've seen a lot of commentary about how patting Ahmed on the back and sending him goodies doesn't actually address the fact that they saw fit to call in 5 cops and handcuff a 14 year old. That doesn't stop them from doing it again. I've seen Ahmed's story put side by side with another kid who built a nuclear fusion reactor. The reaction by people claiming that the police did nothing wrong because "muslims r terrorists it's just the fax guise they had the right to be suspicious" is fucking disgusting.
Welcome to the media, it's not about the actual issues, it's about making the biggest splash, the most outrage, and invoking the most emotions from every tale they can find. Leads to views. Real discussion, deep discussion, and so on, exist only in places like this, where people who see past the "crap" or are part of communities that have taught them to do so. Few people really care about the bigger issues, they care about the shining gold trophy they can hold over their heads and feel good about. The Rosa Parks, the Ahameds, and so on. Racism is over after all. We won that fight.By focusing so much on Ahmed and how people are fixing Ahmed's situation, we're ignoring everyone else that racism affects.
Guarded hope. Ahmed's sister was treated badly in middle school because someone said she was going blow up the school. We're just hearing about that now. A black girl in Florida I think was arrested for making a bomb when she was doing a science experiment, and that got so little attention that I wasn't sure if she made a bomb or a science experiment. The fact that this was quickly and widely condemned seems like progress.
I think the kid purposefully provoked the administration into responding through prompting from his father. I believe that had any other child had shifty-looking electronics in a bag that he showed off to people and then sets the alarm on it to go off during class is looking for a reaction and would have been dealt with in a similar manner. Only by insisting that the administration reacted due to racism makes this a race issue. No one mentions the risk of electrocution or fire from a short were he to plug his device into a socket with all the boards unsecured like that, heck even the 9v supply it must have been running on in his backpack could have started a fire with a short. A device like that is sketchy and unsafe and he purposefully kept bringing attention to it, that's all that matters in this case. Not his skin color.By focusing so much on Ahmed and how people are fixing Ahmed's situation, we're ignoring everyone else that racism affects. I don't know, I just feel like people will be satisfied by seeing Ahmed happy and whatever that they'll forget about the systemic problems and nothing will change.
Dude. We used to stick paperclips in the outlets to make the power go out. That's what breakers do. A 9V battery in a backpack is orders of magnitude less dangerous than a cell phone in a backpack. 9Vs can get hot enough to smoke. LiPo can get hot enough to explode. Yet we put up with cell phone batteries by the dozens in every classroom. You're missing the fact that the kid brought in a project for a class, got credit for that project, and was told "don't show that to anybody" by his teacher. And then, rather than having anyone ask that teacher about the pencil case full of clock parts, the school district called in five cops. Not the bomb squad, mind you.
Wjen I was in fifth grade a kid made a light bulb with steel wool and electronics from model train. It exploded in class. The teacher used the fire extinguisher and everything. We were back in the classroom within an hour. The kid wasn't in any way in trouble. We all thought he was rad.
In this case the wires and boards were unsecured and could easily have shorted, unlike in a cell phone. Had he plugged it in there's an unprotected transformer floating around in the case. Wait, is that true? Nothing I've read said anything about it being a project. You missed the part where the kid continued to show the clock to others and then set the clock to go off during another class after being told not to show anyone else. No, because the kid was trying to cause a disruption with a suspicious device, not with a bomb. Doesn't the whole incident seem suspicious? The kid's behavior, the response, it really seems like there's more behind the story and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the kid has been disruptive in a similar manner before. It's the only explanation that makes any sense.A 9V battery in a backpack is orders of magnitude less dangerous than a cell phone in a backpack. 9Vs can get hot enough to smoke. LiPo can get hot enough to explode. Yet we put up with cell phone batteries by the dozens in every classroom.
You're missing the fact that the kid brought in a project for a class, got credit for that project, and was told "don't show that to anybody" by his teacher.
And then, rather than having anyone ask that teacher about the pencil case full of clock parts, the school district called in five cops.
Not the bomb squad, mind you.
Do you really live in fear of unsecured 9V batteries? Well good news, friend, because an unsecured 9V battery can't make a clock go off. Did you look? He showed it to his engineering teacher first thing Monday morning and didn’t get quite the reaction he’d hoped for. “He was like, ‘That’s really nice,’” Ahmed said. “‘I would advise you not to show any other teachers.’” No, no wait. “She was like, it looks like a bomb,” he said. “I told her, ‘It doesn’t look like a bomb to me.’” The teacher kept the clock. When the principal and a police officer pulled Ahmed out of sixth period, he suspected he wouldn’t get it back. But wait, there's more: Ahmed felt suddenly conscious of his brown skin and his name — one of the most common in the Muslim religion. But the police kept him busy with questions. The bell rang at least twice, he said, while the officers searched his belongings and questioned his intentions. The principal threatened to expel him if he didn’t make a written statement, he said. “They were like, ‘So you tried to make a bomb?’” Ahmed said. “I told them no, I was trying to make a clock.” “He said, ‘It looks like a movie bomb to me.’” "Wait, is that true?" No, I lied. I made it up. I stated something as fact so that maybe you'd accept it at face value and not notice that my entire point is based on falsehood. Does the whole incident seem suspicious? Friend, I had a Pakistani friend who had to stop running at lunch because he got sick of longshoremen spitting on him. But you know what? If I were "suspicious" about something, I might read about it a little more instead of questioning the veracity of people who demonstrably know more than you.Wait, is that true? Nothing I've read said anything about it being a project.
Ahmed’s clock was hardly his most elaborate creation. He said he threw it together in about 20 minutes before bedtime on Sunday: a circuit board and power supply wired to a digital display, all strapped inside a case with a tiger hologram on the front.
He kept the clock inside his school bag in English class, but the teacher complained when the alarm beeped in the middle of a lesson. Ahmed brought his invention up to show her afterward.
They led Ahmed into a room where four other police officers waited. He said an officer he’d never seen before leaned back in his chair and remarked: “Yup. That’s who I thought it was.”
Of course not, just pointing out that the device was sketchy at best. I'm confused. I would say you're being sarcastic but nothing in your comment nor the link you provided says it was a project for school. Ahmed felt suddenly conscious of his brown skin and his name — one of the most common in the Muslim religion. Is he the only brown-skinned child in his school? Because this statement could be considered racist if that's the case....or it still could be because the kid is actually a known trouble-maker and has had similar issues before. Just because the kid claims he hadn't seen the officer before does not mean it's true. He also claimed he invented the clock. Even if the officer had not seen the kid before he may have heard about the child if he was causing trouble from other officers. You're right. Your one friend's anecdotal experiences makes you demonstrably more knowledgeable about a case that we've both read the same information about and you still make statements about that you can't verify.Do you really live in fear of unsecured 9V batteries?
"Wait, is that true?" No, I lied. I made it up. I stated something as fact so that maybe you'd accept it at face value and not notice that my entire point is based on falsehood.
He said an officer he’d never seen before leaned back in his chair and remarked: “Yup. That’s who I thought it was.”
But you know what? If I were "suspicious" about something, I might read about it a little more instead of questioning the veracity of people who demonstrably know more than you.
His points seem more than reasonable. You seem like an authoritarian apologist who doesn't give a shit that your previous "points" were rebutted and will continuously find reasons that five cops need to put an innocent young boy in handcuffs. Why would he want to keep engaging with you? You might not be a cop/authority ass kiss, you also might be a troll.
i just don't get how anyone can believe that. A serious response like that usually has serious reasons behind it, and that is what is actually reasonable to assume. Without clear evidence of racism (like slurs), it's not logical to blame the reaction on racism with the details we know. What was rebutted? That the device was sketchy? That he was told not to show it to others and he ignored that? All I've maintained is that the whole situation seems very strange and that there's no way to know whether the reaction was justified given the details that have come out.His points seem more than reasonable.
You seem like an authoritarian apologist who doesn't give a shit that your previous "points" were rebutted
what? he's a 14 yr old kid who's proud of what he made. of course he's gonna show it off.
He's a 14 year old kid that actually didn't make anything and was told not to show it to others because he might get in trouble and ignored that statement. I suspect the teacher knew he was going to be disruptive (probably based on previous behavior), and really should have held onto the clock until the end of the day to prevent an issue. Does the reaction seem overblown: yes. Does that actually mean we can call it a 100% inappropriate response without knowing all the details and the kid's behavioral history: no.
what do you mean he didn't make anything? shit, as a 23 yr old i couldn't wire a circuit board to anything to save my ass lol. also i like how you're trying to say that we can't draw conclusions based on not knowing his behavioral history but you're over here willy nilly saying things about how he must have been intentionally disruptive. i've seen nothing suggesting either way that he was more or less disruptive than your average kid.
He unscrewed the case to a clock and shoved the components in a pencil box. No wiring at all. Here's a video showing what he did: My point is that it could go either way and generally things don't get such a response for no reason.what do you mean he didn't make anything? shit, as a 23 yr old i couldn't wire a circuit board to anything to save my ass lol.
also i like how you're trying to say that we can't draw conclusions based on not knowing his behavioral history but you're over here willy nilly saying things about how he must have been intentionally disruptive. i've seen nothing suggesting either way that he was more or less disruptive than your average kid.
Enh ok so he didn't reinvent the wheel. still better than your average 14 yr old i'd argue no reason except...racism and islamophobia?
Possibly, or maybe he was truly a disruptive presence in the school. People love to jump on the outrage wagon, though, so the media plays it up. The true test will be in whether or not there's a lawsuit and the outcome of that. I haven't read anything that suggests the parents are going to sue, which also sounds fishy to me. Sounds like they'd get a nice settlement to me as the district wouldn't want to go to court if they couldn't show the kid had behavioral problems.
We've reached the eye of the circlejerk. Nigga I'm not even gonna touch that quote, I just want you to look at it again. If they were that fucking scared they wouldn't have kept it around and in police cars and near teachers and without an evacuation of any kind. You're reaching so hard trying to jerk yourself off with your devil's advocate garbage that you're going to break your pelvis.Only by insisting that the administration reacted due to racism makes this a race issue.
You're right, it won't shock you but if it shorts the battery itself may become hot and could potentially breach. Pretty rare but possible. One of the components may get too much power running through it from a short which would cause that component to heat up and possibly spark, as well.