What to do?
I went to a concert tonight. Good concert. Liked the band. They played well, they always do. In a small, old, elegant hall holding maybe a couple hundred, they performed a two part show with typical style.
While waiting out front to meet some people that I didn't know, I saw a 30ish guy, black hair, big big bushy beard, walking to the concert from his car, with a black backpack.
My friend's 15 year old described the would-be crowd this way, when he declined to come, "menopausal lesbians". By my way of thinking this guy stood out. He was tall, not that that is a crime, there was one guy taller. He had a serenity about him. Seemed to be alone. I'd say he was 30 or less. Which made him 15-20 years younger than the rest of us. Definitely not a menopausal lesbian.
To me, he didn't fit. And why did he need to take a backpack into a concert hall.
My friend's friends found me, and my friends found me and we went in to see the show. I forgot about the backpack guy till I see him sitting in the row in front of us.
Does he have the backpack? I can't see.
Should I say something? I know in my own mind I'm profiling. I have no authority anyway. I wasn't there when he went through the line. Did they check him? Could they have missed the backpack?
Should I say something?
posted by Maqz @ 1:09 AM
3 Comments:
Fear and paranoia in Sydney? OH MY!
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/41444/ for get a grip already on the threat to you of terrorism.
We are about 200 miles from the world trade site. We are much closer than most Americans. I personally did not know anyone killed on 9/11. As far as I know, I do not know anyone who has had a family member or close, or even not so close friend, killed by terrorists. Even if I did the chances of it happening to me or my loved ones is remote.
I know a person who was hit by lighting, twice. I have a brother in-law who survived 115,000 volts of electricity through his body. I have been in several car incidents in which I could have been killed if things were just a little different. I knew someone who won the lottery. These are all very rare things. Being killed or hurt by a terrorist is even rarer.
40,000 plus of us get killed in car crashes each year. That is about 14 9/11 a year. Kids die every day. Every parent’s worst nightmare is their kid getting killed or hurt badly. Cancer kills lots, Smoking kills 400,000 a year. Why are we so afraid?
Home of the free? Land of the brave? We have become sniveling cowards, afraid of the next boggy man that W claims is out to get us.
Two people in the world want us to be afraid. Two people want us to think there is a clash of civilizations, that WW3 or 4 has started. Two egotistical people want be seen as hero of there side. Like horribly deformed Siamese twins both think they have god on there side. Linked together, there interests are the same. They both believe in their own version of Armageddon. Both want to fulfill what they see as gods plan. W and Osama, two peas from equally deformed pods.
Only one is smarted than the other and he is winning. See:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/11/AR2006091100880.html
.
What changed? The day that changed everything. See:
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0911-34.htm
Ed
BTW, Although it sounds like I'm ragging on you Steve, I'm not. I fly a lot and have the same feeling if I see something different about someone.
Ed
Well, I agree, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself". I've taken the pulse on this thing and gotten both sides.
I still think it is reasonable to ask a 'profiled' person why he must bring a backpack into a concert.
Maybe the profiled part is irrelevant.
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