Originally Posted by GUWonder
Did you really mean to use a double negative-type phrasing there with security workers "told from above not to avoid intentionally extra screening" "arabs" & "middle easterners"? As it is stated, it could be read by some to indicate that security screeners were given the "wink-wink, nod-nod" to go ahead and intentionally extra screen like xenophobes, which is exactly what they did. But I don't think that is what you are saying. Could you please restate that without the double negative-type phrasing which can lead to ambiguity?
Lesson to me: Posts will make more sense and exclude double negatives if not made before/during breakfast. Of course, now I'm posting late at night, which may be no better.
I meant to say that there were reports of screeners being afraid to select "middle-eastern"-looking people for additional screening at all because any such screening would look bad. These reports occurred mainly just after 9/11.
Of course, there was plenty of discrimination against "middle-eastern"-looking people too, but to some extent it did go both ways with favoritism by some and discrimination by others.
Also, the number of phone calls from airports that were handled by certain FBI field offices on matters that appear to have been related to people of "Middle Eastern" "origin" flying out of certain airports jumped up while calls from those same airports related to people not of "Middle Eastern" origin didn't seem to have skyrocketed in number.
That's individual overzealousness/stupidity and not government. Any crank can call in such reports. They could call them in on me because I have a beard. The subset of people who think they can pick out "middle easterners" on sight is almost certainly less accurate at such selection than the general public.
Contrary to reports about "Middle Eastern" types being a "protected category", such persons are anything but a "protected" category when it comes to selection by security idiocy at airports (i.e., the haraSSSSment-producing engines, various blacklists, picked on by ignorant xenophobes at airports, etc.).
Among the PC crowd, anyone who is not a white male U.S. citizen is in a protected category. Among the crowd of overzealous/stupid individuals I mentioned above, anyone who is not white is suspicious. I think both crowds are somewhat wacko.
The only meaningful quota that would have the meaning you may be giving to it would be one that said that not more than X% of all "Middle Eastern" paxs at a particular airport may be selected on a given day and that X% was the same percentage as applicable to the majority/dominant ethnic group(s) too.
I disagree that such data collection would be meaningful. LEOs/screeners who knew of the data collection but wanted to do racial profiling would do so and simply fix their percentages by stopping otherwise unsuspicious white people. LEOs/screeners who are just scared of getting in trouble will end up selecting people to meet the appropriate racial breakdown instead of based on actual suspicion. Neither scenario improves security.
Any time you inject race into a process searching for something that is supposed to be race-neutral, it corrupts the process. That's why I refuse to fill out racial data on job applications and HR forms; the only purpose it can serve is to make people focus on something other than merit.