it is texas timeFollow

So, long story, but I will shorten it somewhat. Muslim kid in Texas brought a clock to school. The clock was made by himself. Clock's alarm went off during a lesson. The teacher apparently freaked out, but only after the lesson ended; contacted his boss who called police, who determined that it was not a bomb.

It probably should have ended there. In fact, it probably should have ended at the teacher. But the kid was handcuffed, interrogated without their guardian present, fingerprinted at a detention center, and, apparently, suspended. IDT took this opportunity to send a letter to parents that stated, among other things:



Digital clocks are prohibited. I am just sayin'

I am genuinely annoyed by this. Here is a kid, who actually does things other than jack off, tweet and takes interest in things other than football; here is a kid that seems to have a genuine interest in how things work.

And what did he learn today? That in US is not cool to learn while Muslim,that US it is not cool to display any sort of intelligence. The sad thing is; if he was not jaded before; he will be now.

The cool thing is, FB and White House took notice and Obama invited the kid to WH.

The sad thing; the really sad thing in that report is this little nugget:



The **** America. The ****. Seriously.

Thank goodness it wasn't a toaster. Irviing PD would have thought it was an IED armed with bread.

I think even you will agree that there certain level of difference between school and WH. One is not like the other.

As for the clock, it was determined NOT to be a bomb and it was still pursued under "well, it may not be a bomb, but maybe he wanted to make it look like sort of a bomb". Hell, the police told everyone they could it was not a bomb. Are you telling me that you cannot carry **** with you no matter how benign it is? Do I have consider the possibility that some functional ****** watched too much 24, or should I expect a little bit more from people who are a position of authority?

So you CAN and you SHOULD fault the school officials, and the police for overreacting. It was not necessary and it only ensures that HS in US remains among the worst in the world. Unless you are going for that. If so, good job.

Sure. But it's the White House Obama is inviting him to visit. A location where I'm sure the security reaction would have been far far more dramatic than the school's. As you say, one is not like the other.



It's not stated in the article at what point the police were sure it wasn't a bomb. It only says (present tense) "And police have no reason to think it was dangerous.". That came from the police spokesperson later. Again, note the tense. If the police on the scene knew it wasn't a bomb, it would say "had", not "have". The other speculate was after the fact as well. It was about whether they should charge him for a hoax because he brought something that looked like a bomb to school. The point being that this article does not say at all that the police and others at the scene knew it wasn't a bomb, and was completely harmless. It does, however, include two quotes from two different members of the staff saying that it did look like a bomb to them (and presumably the third teacher who told him not to show it to anyone had his reasons for telling him that).



If it's something that nearly every single random person who sees it will assume *is* something that is dangerous? Yeah. Tell you what. Go build a device just like the one he did, and walk around a downtown street holding it and see how long it takes for a swat team to show up. I'll wait.

Just because you know something is harmless doesn't mean that others around you do. Demanding a security response based on "people should know that I didn't make something dangerous" is kinda unworkable, right? Security have to assume that anything they see that looks like it could be dangerous is dangerous. It doesn't work the other way.



The story does not provide details about the decision making process timeline though. It only looks like an overreaction after the fact. If that had, in fact, been a bomb, we'd be praising the quick thinking action of the staff at the school for saving the lives of many students. I think that one student learning the harsh lesson that it's a bad idea to bring something to school that might look like a bomb is a small price to pay to ensure that the next kid, who maybe really is bringing a bomb to school, doesn't kill a bunch of students. And frankly, I think the public reaction towards the school and police is really harmful. For the sake of political correctness, we're going to basically tell every other school in the country that they shouldn't respond to a potential bomb in their school? That's pretty insane.


There have been a ton of harsh seeming reactions to students under our zero tolerance rules. It's an issue, and one that I tend to lean against. But in this case, the reaction is strange. Do we set a separate reactionary standard for Muslim kinds now? Cause that's what it looks like we're doing here. If this kid was white, I'm reasonably certain that the overwhelming reaction would have been "that was dumb of him". He certainly would not have gotten an invite to the White House. I do agree that our zero tolerance rules are problematic, but I'm not comfortable with what I see as a reaction to it that's based on the person involved, and not the action taken. Objectively, it's hard to argue that what he did was anything less than monumentally stupid. Hand waving that away because "he's a good kid", just doesn't work in my opinion. Rules (and laws) have to apply equally for everyone. Even (maybe especially) for ones we may disagree with.

Oddly, you are right here; we do not know the exact timeline yet. I am sure we will in the coming days. While we wait, it seems that the cops knew it was not a bomb and tried to charge him with something anyway.



I do not believe it is strictly a muslim issue; I think, just like you, seemingly, do that Full agreement. I do even agree that zero tolerance are - I would have said idiotic.

That said, as a country that is currently bemoaning a shortage of STEM workers ( ignore for a second whether those claims are true ), do we really want to kill any kind creativity in those children in the name of fake safety? And as for your silly argument that were the kid was white, it would be summarily dismissed. It wasn't. It didn't get as much traction, but it definitely made the news, because of the level overreaction. And for what? A ******' chemistry set.

I am not saying he is a good kid. I am saying the message it sends to everyone out there is the following: do not deviate from the norm, do not take interest, do not tinker, or, most importantly, if you do, do not tell others. This is not the message you want to send you if you want to grow semi-intelligent Americans.

I know, I know, school is not a place to learn. School is a place to enter a societal mold and to become a member of the consumer class.

Edited, Sep 16th 2015 10:48pm by angrymnk

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH


Yeah, I'm totally sure that if the clock-bringer had been the schools' star quarterback, the exact same scenario would have played out.


HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA


Oh, you!

Everyone outside of America?

You'd think thirty years of bomb threats and kids shooting up schools would relax people.

Nah, the kid is brown, not-Christian, and in Texas. He didn't stand a chance.

Last month was so long ago.

To be fair, this is Texas we're talking about. If a kid's the star quarterback and winning games, he can probably get away with just about anything regardless of race.

A suitcase bomb with absolutely no explosives or detonator, sure. It has some wires and circuit boards, clearly it's set to blow.

The qualifications under the Texas "hoax bomb" statute don't apply:

Ahmed did not present the item as a bomb, repeatedly told people that it was a clock, his engineering teacher knew that it was a clock and the damn thing doesn't have any sort of explosive (or fake explosive) within it.

In that it's in a case, I guess. A pencil case, by the way, not a suitcase -- using the plug in the photo for scale, it's probably 4"x6"x1" or so. Maybe it's a GI Joe suitcase bomb? Any half-intelligent person would probably also question "Hey, where's the stuff that's supposed to make the earth-shattering kaboom?" but I suppose those types are in short supply around Breitbart.

It's also safe to assume that everyone knew it wasn't a bomb given that everyone's response was to stand around it for several hours rather than, you know, maybe trying to be someplace the "bomb" isn't. So why were the police contacted in the first place?

Huh? You're basing this off what? If he took apart an existing clock, he must have taken apart the shittiest clock available for sale that requires multiple separate circuit boards to keep time. This isn't saying that he didn't use any clock components, but that's different from just taking a clock as a whole and putting it in a different case. [Edit: Some sites point out common clock components but, again, there seems to be differences of opinion about if it was a DIY kit, created from stock components, etc]

Another fair assertion would be "Man, Gbaji really will just repeat anything he reads on a conservative blog without spending any moments of independent thought".

Edited, Sep 17th 2015 6:24pm by Jophiel