14 y/o Muslim student arrested for bringing "bomb" to school[It was a Clock]

[Tiberius]

after all, Maher is right-- we can't assume that a teenaged Muslim was not recruited by ISIS, as we have seen happen repeatedly

He's not right at all. Yes, we *can* assume that a teenage Muslim was not recruited by ISIS; y'know why? Because hardly any American teenage Muslims are. It's a fraction of a fraction of a percent; these are the numbers we are talking about here. Pick any muslim (old or young) in America, and it's overwhelmingly likely that they have nothing to do with terrorism.

If we went around not assuming the best about people, the world would be an awful place. Those kids hanging out by the bus stop? Probably part of a gang! That old guy who's walking near to a school? Probably a pedophile!

This is not how we should treat people. Innocent until proven guilty, and that concept should apply to social interactions, not just our judicial system.

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Should.

Indeed, and I agree.

[Reforged]

To be fair he was probably planning some greater feat of evil with the clock.
Did it tick? How annoying was the alarm? Oh fuck it, just arrest him for being brown.

[Aroura]

Ok, I'm chiming in only because I'm very confused....this case does not appear to be nearly as clear cut as some people seem to want to make it.

So, it clearly was not a bomb. But not everyone is going to know much about electronics. An English teacher was the one who eventually got him in trouble
The kid had it, showed it off for hours around school for hours, so this was not a case of zero tolerance, or of people immediately assuming the little brown boy had a bomb.
The teacher did not get comlience, and I'm sorry but she has the right to send a non-compliant student to the principal.

At this point, it looks to me like the kid was looking for a reaction, and didn't get it until he got to English class. That's normal for teens, true. But it's also normal for a teen pushing a teacher to get sent to the principal. So, at this point in the story, I don't think anyone has done anything "wrong".

Here is where it gets murky. So the principal calls the police, and it is the police that overreact?? I mean, honestly, I don't know what a bomb might or might not look like either, and if it's true the kid was not responding to his teachers, then I can understand some fear. Obvisouly the did not OVER react and evacuate the school or anything. So I don't undertand why the teachers are taking so much heat.

Now, everything that happens once the cops are called is messed up and wrong, and should not have happened to the kid, but how it GOT there, I can totally see how that happened. And the teachers did nothing wrong that I can tell from any version of the story. And hey, I'm normally the one bashing public schools, so...

I watched that video CL posted. Id on't agree with all of it, but there are some good points. The best point was how people pick sides before the know the whole story. That drive me totally nuts. This is not a clear cut issue of racism or Islamaphobia, or white privilge or even of police brutality.

Personally, a part of me wonders if that very smart boy didn't know damn well what he was doing, and kept showing it off to teachers until he got the reaction he was looking for. He's effing lucky the stupid police didn't shoot him in the head or some horrible thing.
And now....he will be rewarded (quite largly rewarded, I might add) for disobeying his teacher, because the police were dicks. Jeeze, this is a very complicated issue.

[KevinM1]

I don't blame the school for calling the cops. Between shootings and various threats against many schools (including bomb threats), an overabundance of caution is warranted.

I do blame the cops for holding him without letting him contact his parents. I do blame the cops for arresting him when there's no probable cause.

Nerdy kid had a circuit board wired up to a display and an alarm. Bombs don't have an alarm (unless you count the explosion as a very loud alarm). And it takes all of, what, 30 minutes to safely check the device, his belongings, and his locker to ensure he doesn't have any explosive material?

And what was up with Hitchens(?) getting his panties in a wad over the kid saying he invented that clock? Maybe invented was the wrong word, but it's pretty impressive for a 14 year old to successfully create a digital clock with working alarm. I had to create a digital display once at UNH, and couldn't get one of the numbers (I think it was 7 or 8) to work correctly, and that was without the extra complexity of a timing mechanism or alarm added in.

[Minimalist]

If we went around not assuming the best about people, the world would be an awful place. Those kids hanging out by the bus stop? Probably part of a gang! That old guy who's walking near to a school? Probably a pedophile!

Um, Divi Tiberio, if you look through the Fucking Cops thread you'll see that they do that all the time.... mainly if the kids or the old guy are minorities.

I highly recommend Glenn Greenwald's book:  And Justice for Some.

[Catholic_Lady]

Ok, I'm chiming in only because I'm very confused....this case does not appear to be nearly as clear cut as some people seem to want to make it.

So, it clearly was not a bomb.  But not everyone is going to know much about electronics.  An English teacher was the one who eventually got him in trouble
The kid had it, showed it off for hours around school for hours, so this was not a case of zero tolerance, or of people immediately assuming the little brown boy had a bomb.
The teacher did not get comlience, and I'm sorry but she has the right to send a non-compliant student to the principal.

At this point, it looks to me like the kid was looking for a reaction, and didn't get it until he got to English class.  That's normal for teens, true.  But it's also normal for a teen pushing a teacher to get sent to the principal.  So, at this point in the story, I don't think anyone has done anything "wrong".

Here is where it gets murky.  So the principal calls the police, and it is the police that overreact??  I mean, honestly, I don't know what a bomb might or might not look like either, and if it's true the kid was not responding to his teachers, then I can understand some fear.  Obvisouly the did not OVER react and evacuate the school or anything.  So I don't undertand why the teachers are taking so much heat.

Now, everything that happens once the cops are called is messed up and wrong, and should not have happened to the kid, but how it GOT there, I can totally see how that happened. And the teachers did nothing wrong that I can tell from any version of the story. And hey, I'm normally the one bashing public schools, so...

I watched that video CL posted.  Id on't agree with all of it, but there are some good points.  The best point was how people pick sides before the know the whole story.  That drive me totally nuts.  This is not a clear cut issue of racism or Islamaphobia, or white privilge or even of police brutality.

Personally, a part of me wonders if that very smart boy didn't know damn well what he was doing, and kept showing it off to teachers until he got the reaction he was looking for. He's effing lucky the stupid police didn't shoot him in the head or some horrible thing.  
And now....he will be rewarded (quite largly rewarded, I might add) for disobeying his teacher, because the police were dicks.  Jeeze, this is a very complicated issue.

The info that came out later, Aurora, was that the police never thought it was a bomb. They thought it was a hoax bomb, which is also a serious offense. They took him to the station for further questioning because he was not being very forthcoming. What exactly happened at the police station, is not known. The kid said the police unfairly commented about his race and mistreated him. Is he telling the truth? Is he exaggerating a little bit? He's a 14 year old kid. Who knows. 

I agree though. The way this story was being presented was that bigoted teachers had this little Muslim kid arrested because they assumed his clock was a bomb. But yet there's more to the story than that. Let's try to be objective and not automatically pick the hero and the villain without having all the details and knowing the whole story.

[Aroura]

I'm also kind of pissed, now that I look into this, that this kid is basically being given anything he wants, when other children who did exactly nothing wrong still languish in the system, and don't even get any press.  

11 year old gifted boy pot leaf, not a pot leaf

So, where is the invite for this bright young child to come to the white house?  Where is his Tons of shit from Microsoft?  He's been permanently damaged (unlike the boy in this story, who at worst had a little scare from cops, but even that is still in question).  Why is he still being punished?

So yeah.  If the police did treat him badly, that absolutely needs to be brought to light, and those officers disciplined.  That is not acceptable.  
But the teachers reactions were not in the wrong, as far as anyone's story goes, even the boys.  This kid is basically being rewarded for being a minority who "MIGHT" have been mistreated by police. Everyone grab your weapon and pick a side though, amIrite?

Batrachomyomachy.  Look it up.

[Cecelia]

The only thing that really bothers me about all of this is that the boy is going to get an easy ride now, while other great students will never get such a ride.

I have a student in one of my classes. She's a BRILLIANT student. She could easily get into any college she wanted. But she can't afford it. Her family is in a lot of debt, and she'll be lucky to get to go to college at all.

I think people are going a bit far with giving him all this stuff. The invitation to Astronomy Night at the White House? Okay. Microsoft giving him all sorts of stuff? really? I think it's great to encourage the minds of children to learn. But I also think that can be done without a bunch of free stuff.

[bennyboy]

The only thing that really bothers me about all of this is that the boy is going to get an easy ride now, while other great students will never get such a ride.

I have a student in one of my classes.  She's a BRILLIANT student.  She could easily get into any college she wanted.  But she can't afford it.  Her family is in a lot of debt, and she'll be lucky to get to go to college at all.  

I think people are going a bit far with giving him all this stuff.  The invitation to Astronomy Night at the White House? Okay.  Microsoft giving him all sorts of stuff?  really?  I think it's great to encourage the minds of children to learn.  But I also think that can be done without a bunch of free stuff.

That's life.  Some people get lucky breaks.  I don't blame this kid for happening to be the one.