
Panic at EWR after racial profiling - leemailll
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/amberjamieson/alaska-airlines-newark-chaos
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tus88
I would love if the title said "Newark Airport" instead of EWR which I had no
idea what it meant.

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egdod
Pretty strange. Why would she be racially profiling Asians as terrorist
suspects? Have we had a rash of Chinese guys blowing up planes that I somehow
missed?

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gfodor
If the person involved is suffering from mental illness, trying to ascribe any
kind of rational (or even an irrational, but directional, motive like racism)
seems folly. Is there any evidence to show this persons actions were based
upon racial profiling and not some form of temporary insanity? IANAP but it
seems as likely as not to me that the employee bumping into the person on line
was the triggering event.

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derekbreden
Why would mental illness, temporary or any other temporality, be reason to
eliminate any value in categorizing the specifics of the behavior as racist?

If not all racism, maybe some racism could be a symptom of mental illness? [1]

[1]
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1071634/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1071634/)

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gfodor
I never claimed it eliminated any value, but to answer your question more
directly, it reduces the value for the same reason it reduces the value of
_any_ action taken by an clinically insane person in terms of moral weight vs
one who is sane: the insane person is presumed to have lost the ability to
reason and act rationally due to factors outside of their free will.

Of course, more to the point, is the fact that based on the article the extent
of the evidence that this was racial profiling is that the victim speculated
it was such, and the two victims were of similar ethnic origin. That, combined
with the fact that it sounds like there is evidence supporting the idea the
person may have been having a mental episode, should call into question the
journalistic integrity of the author who in the title claims as fact that
racism was the cause of the employee's behavior.

At the very least, it seems like there is _some_ chance that this person had
some kind of lapse in sanity, and this article now labels that person as being
a racist -- if that person's name were included in the article, they'd likely
now be the target of an internet mob and persona non grata. Insofar as the
allegations about their mental illness are true and have been identified as
the cause (unknown) I commend Alaska Airlines for protecting the person's
identity.

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derekbreden
I believe I mistook the use of the word folly in a context that was not
relevant.

I would not feel qualified to say for whom it might be of value, but my
thinking was perhaps for the individual having their behavior being
categorized, or a clinician assisting them. Not super relevant here.

We're talking about the journalist, and perhaps ourselves, and in that light
folly makes a lot more sense than it did in how I had initially
misinterpreted.

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chrischen
This is as much racial profiling as it would be if the airline employee
accused them of being bad at math because they were Asian.

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rayiner
> But once police arrived within a minute and started scanning the crowd, Xue
> said he felt compelled to come forward and identify himself. "I'm like, So,
> 90% chance I have something to do with this and it's escalated way too
> fast," said Xue.

This story makes no sense. Why the hell would he volunteer to the police he
was involved? Who “racially profiles” Chinese people at an airport?

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teej
> Who “racially profiles” Chinese people at an airport?

Alaska Airlines employees, apparently.

