Ahmed Shihab-Eldin writes Why I Hate Coming Home to America:
Like all Americans (and every human being for that matter), I want to be safe. But I can’t help but question the efficacy of our national security policy, including the practice of detaining U.S. citizens because something (never specifically explained) about a name or person’s identity is said to match that of someone somewhere in the world who is deemed to pose a threat to America. How close is the match? What aspects of one’s “profile” are searched for a match? None of that is ever explained.
Read the whole piece… Ahmed is very aware of the “safety” of screening and all that crap, but come on, WTF guys. Why can’t you just say “we’re going to discriminate against brown people because they’re brown… oh, and anyone with a funny terrorist name” and have it out in the open, instead of pretending that they were randomly selected, or a profile match, or whatever excuse that isn’t “you look like the people who attacked the US on 9/11 so we’re going to fuck with you”.
Come on.