high schooler arrested for bringing a clock "bomb" to school

[Aeroblast]

don't know if this news has been posted somewhere already, if so please merge

http://www.mintpressnews.com/hillar...s-arrest-for-bringing-clock-to-school/209605/

Synopsis:

After taking a homemade clock to school, Irving MacArthur High student Ahmed Mohamed, 14, was taken in handcuffs to juvenile detention. Police say they may charge him with making a hoax bomb — though they acknowledge he told everyone who would listen that it's a clock.

 

[Somewhere_]

I have heard about this and its really stupid. They really dont have any proof to prosecute him with, and the english teacher new he was interested in creating electronics.

Was he interrogated without parental consent?

 

[Kanzler]

Very unfortunately that such an event had to happen. I do not think that a teen of any other race or creed would have been treated the same way. But now he will know how things are done in certain places in America. His engineering teacher knew as much.

Also:

"He said, 'It looks like a movie bomb to me.'"

LOL. That's not the only misconception the principal got from mass media.

 

[Spacy]

Since when are clocks bombs?

 

[gimmepie]

This is just ridiculous, institutionalised racism at its finest. From what I understand it was common knowledge that he was interested in making electronics and even the police acknowledge he told anyone who would listen it's a clock - yet they're still considering prosecuting?

Pathetic.

 

[Keiran]

They never thought he had a bomb. They never evacuated the school, they kept the clock in the office while they waited for the police, then they put the clock in the police car and took pictures of it. None of that is how you actually deal with a bomb threat. You evacuate the building and call a bomb disposal squad.

What actually happened is that they saw a brown, muslim kid flying too close to the sun and decided to humiliate him. How can we perpetuate our for-profit prison system if we allow non-white kids to take interest in anything but crime?

🐸☕️

 

[Candy]

Y'know I rarely even make a post over here in this section.

But wow. Just fucking wow.

This is blatant racism from brain-dead teachers (aside from the engineering teacher; at least he has some common sense) and policemen, whose Islamophobia also gets the better of their rational judgement.

They should stop lumping the two groups of Islam and Terrorists into one single category. This mindset is not health at all.

 

[Winter]

Yeah this whole issue makes me sick to my stomach. This is pure discrimination and power abuse. His parents weren't even notified of his arrest. It's an absolute perversion of justice.

I feel so sad that an intelligent child has to be stifled and suffocated by a sea of ignorance.

 

[Crystal Berry]

Oh my gosh this makes me so sad. =/
The way they're treating him for simply trying to impress them with his talent, unbelievable. When I was in school I would try to impress my teachers with my own creations (although I was offering baked goods, not something that took nearly the same talent as this). I doubt it actually looked like a bomb, and how could someone be stupid enough to bring a bomb to school and deliberately show it to people anyway? I think this kid is probably scarred and desensitized, unless he has personally experienced Islamophobia before (I don't know).

 

[Pinkie-Dawn]

Heard about this a few days ago; it's really outlandish, and it's not helping Texas' image one bit.

 

[Caite-chan]

This is just stupidity at it's finest. I can't believe they actually did everything that they did. And I think that they did interrogate him without his parents around.

 

[twocows]

I think Popehat said it best. The response was utterly ridiculous and they ought to be ashamed that they let their paranoia get the better of them and even more ashamed that a child went through so much crap as a result. The kid made something cool and all the adults involved not only completely overreacted, they failed to deescalate the situation once it was obvious that he didn't do anything wrong.

 

[Murmansk]

I don't see it as racism or religious discrimination. I had a similar thing happen to me due to a "he-said-she-said" type incident. Basically someone accused me of making a threat which the school staff asked around about that in turn led to increasing accusations with no proof for me having done anything of the sort.

So yeah, I had the whole separation from family and interrogation by a mixture of police and school officials. The police then came to search my house for guns and or homemade bombs.

It's discriminatory but not on the basis or skin so much as the basis of age. School staff can pretty much shit on the students because there's basically no chance for recourse due to how legal rights are determined in the US.

If you wanna push some kids around and talk down to and intimidate them to get a power trip, you can. Though in my experience I wouldn't be surprised if they did think it was a bomb and were just generally incompetent all around. I mean, hell, one staff member figured out what was going on right away in regards to my situation but it had to be investigated for roughly 8 more school days before I could be allowed back onto campus. (Thankfully this triggered my removal from that system so best of wishes to our little engineering friend in having the same pleasant experience I did in being able to get the hell outta that human farm)

 

[Livewire]

It's sad and disgusting. Islamophobia, prejudice, everything ugly about the post-9/11 world rolled up into one nasty event. I would love for there to be some inquiries into how these events are handled, because this is flat out unacceptable.

 

[Bounsweet]

The engineering teacher was the only smart adult in this entire ridiculous event. Also, if these morons were so convinced it was a bomb then why didn't they evacuate the shool? Lol. Just a ridiculous amount of stupidity too highly concentrated in one area. I feel really bad for this kid to be exposed to this level of Islamophobia as a result of pursuing something that he really loves to do and is obviously extremely talented at.

 

[Dracovoid]

This case is simply opzing racism. Even if they thought it was a bomb they were pretty stupid to not evacuate the school. Maybe they just wanted the poor muslim kid to suffer as they couldnt bear him doing extremely well at school.... sad to see the kid being dealt with so harshly.

Well I think alls well ends well now he has a chance to meet the president and other celebrities so thats all good. All thats left is to punish the principal, reachers and officers that refused to listen to him and didnt even call his parents.

 

[Nah]

I don't see it as racism or religious discrimination. I had a similar thing happen to me due to a "he-said-she-said" type incident. Basically someone accused me of making a threat which the school staff asked around about that in turn led to increasing accusations with no proof for me having done anything of the sort.

So yeah, I had the whole separation from family and interrogation by a mixture of police and school officials. The police then came to search my house for guns and or homemade bombs.

It's discriminatory but not on the basis or skin so much as the basis of age. School staff can pretty much shit on the students because there's basically no chance for recourse due to how legal rights are determined in the US.

If you wanna push some kids around and talk down to and intimidate them to get a power trip, you can. Though in my experience I wouldn't be surprised if they did think it was a bomb and were just generally incompetent all around. I mean, hell, one staff member figured out what was going on right away in regards to my situation but it had to be investigated for roughly 8 more school days before I could be allowed back onto campus. (Thankfully this triggered my removal from that system so best of wishes to our little engineering friend in having the same pleasant experience I did in being able to get the hell outta that human farm)

I do agree with you that this started off or was partly due to school corruption/incompetence (our education system is terrible really), and I feel that sometimes some people are too eager to look for racism/discrimination in everything, but I feel that this got to the point it did because the kid was Muslim. I can imagine the school freaking about it and calling the cops if you or I brought a homemade clock to school, and even getting interrogated, but I doubt that either of us would actually get arrested for it either.

 

[ForgottenPass]

Who cares really? A little silly story came to the media outlet.

I think the joke I saw at Slashdot still stands. Invited to the white house, now he gets scholarships and stuff.. he ended up better than worse. The whole thing was planned.

 

[tokyodrift]

Agreeing that it's Islamophobia at its finest. If they thought it was a bomb, why didn't they evacuate the school? Post-9/11 has everyone so afraid and profiling a kid is just plain wrong.

 

[maccrash]

Who cares really? A little silly story came to the media outlet.

I think the joke I saw at Slashdot still stands. Invited to the white house, now he gets scholarships and stuff.. he ended up better than worse. The whole thing was planned.

it's not "a little silly story" -- it's yet another example of the blatant racism that runs rampant throughout the Southern US. I don't think this is going to actually cause anything to change, but it's yet another example of this huge problem that so many people ignore being thrust into the spotlight. adding onto that, this is absolutely a traumatizing experience that I'm sure he'd rather not have had, so him "ending up better than worse" is a moot point, and I'm sure he wouldn't think so, himself.