Opti
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Post by Opti on Sept 16, 2015 8:56:08 GMT -5
www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/texas-high-school-student-arrested-suspended-after-bringing-homemade-clock-to-school/ar-AAelysP?li=BBgzzfc&ocid=iehp
The freshman at MacArthur High School was detained by police Monday after the principal and authorities were shown his invention. Mohamed said he enjoys making radios and other gadgets at home, so on Sunday, he spent about 20 minutes putting together the clock, using a circuit board, digital display, and case. He told The Dallas Morning News he showed his engineering teacher at the beginning of the school day, who said it was "really nice," then added, "I would advise you not to show any other teachers." Mohamed kept the clock in his bag, but an English teacher heard the alarm go off during class, and he showed her the device. Mohamed said she told him it "looks like a bomb," then kept it.
Mohamed said he was in sixth period when the principal, accompanied by a police officer, pulled him from class. He was led to a room where four other officers were waiting for him, including one he had never seen before who said: "Yup, that's who I thought it was." Mohamed said he was searched and told by the principal that if he didn't write a statement, he'd be expelled. Mohamed was handcuffed and taken to a juvenile detention center, where he was fingerprinted. After that, he was released to his parents.
Police spokesman James McLellan said authorities "have no information that he claimed it was a bomb. He kept maintaining it was a clock, but there was no broader explanation."
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Opti
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Post by Opti on Sept 16, 2015 9:03:47 GMT -5
I think it was unwise for the kid to bring it to school given the type of case it was in. But I am somewhat surprised that if there was an true concern it was a bomb, that the police did not have a bomb squad inspect it and proceed accordingly.
I think he did get a raw deal because of his name and origins. (I really should not read the comments section. Some guy posted in all caps that girls are ready to be mothers when they get their first period so its OK to marry them off young. Sigh. Ignore the death rate, physical problems of girls and infants when girls get pregnant younger than 19 too. Who cares, crazy male poster? )
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AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP
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Post by AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP on Sept 17, 2015 14:49:42 GMT -5
THIS is what little Mohammad ACTUALLY walked into school with. The media is deliberately misleading the public about this issue. How about you try to get this through security at the Airport? Well, actually given our TSA, you'd probably succeed, but you know what I mean. Islamophobia? How many times have kids been sent home for chewing Pop Tarts into the shape of a gun-- but sending little Mohammad home with this is "Islamophobia"? townhall.com/columnists/jimhanson/2015/09/17/a-clock-or-a-bomb-trigger-n2053448 I'm firmly convinced that these incidents are dry runs for real attacks. They're first and foremost testing our systems, and if they can- they're softening up our defenses. The objective is clear: make sure all the little Ahmed Mohammads in this country can go anywhere they want with anything they want and anyone that says anything risks their job, social ostracism. Then, one day, when the time is right bombs start going off at schools all over the country. It's just like I said, Americans are going to wake up one day to the news that buses are blowing up all over the country, some have been hijacked, and the heads of little American infidels are being chucked out the back door as the buses roll down the road for the whole country to see. We'd better wake UP!
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Post by justme on Sept 17, 2015 15:02:49 GMT -5
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Post by midjd on Sept 17, 2015 15:05:14 GMT -5
If that's true, then why didn't the school call in the bomb squad? Does the act of arresting someone magically defuse a bomb? The fact that they apparently didn't take any steps to protect public safety other than calling the police is what leads me to believe it was at least in part based on the race and religion of the student. If they're truly worried about a potential bomb, they evacuate the building and call in the bomb-sniffing dogs, they don't have a CTJ talk with the student and send him off to juvey. I was a freshman in HS when the Columbine shooting happened and we had those drills about once a week from April 20 - graduation -- so it's not like the schools aren't used to responding to bomb threats. ETA -- oddly enough, the only people I know of who have threatened to bring a bomb to school or have actually done so have been white and non-Muslim... wonder what they're testing us for?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2015 15:16:15 GMT -5
This is something I picked up on FB about this and it explains my thoughts very well
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billisonboard
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Post by billisonboard on Sept 17, 2015 15:25:02 GMT -5
... I'm firmly convinced that these incidents are dry runs for real attacks. They're first and foremost testing our systems, and if they can- they're softening up our defenses. The objective is clear: make sure all the little Ahmed Mohammads in this country can go anywhere they want with anything they want and anyone that says anything risks their job, social ostracism. Then, one day, when the time is right bombs start going off at schools all over the country. It's just like I said, Americans are going to wake up one day to the news that buses are blowing up all over the country, some have been hijacked, and the heads of little American infidels are being chucked out the back door as the buses roll down the road for the whole country to see. We'd better wake UP! How is this "testing our systems"? It would have been very simple to have this student blow up "the bomb" at the beginning of the day instead of showing it to a teacher. It would have been very simple to have this student blow up "the bomb" on the bus on its way to school. It would be very simple to have this done any morning by multiple students. How does this particular specific situation do anything to alter that existing reality?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2015 15:57:20 GMT -5
Later can you link that on FB?
I dont know how Paul lives in this world.
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Tennesseer
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Post by Tennesseer on Sept 17, 2015 15:59:26 GMT -5
THIS is what little Mohammad ACTUALLY walked into school with. The media is deliberately misleading the public about this issue. How about you try to get this through security at the Airport? Well, actually given our TSA, you'd probably succeed, but you know what I mean. Islamophobia? How many times have kids been sent home for chewing Pop Tarts into the shape of a gun-- but sending little Mohammad home with this is "Islamophobia"? townhall.com/columnists/jimhanson/2015/09/17/a-clock-or-a-bomb-trigger-n2053448 I'm firmly convinced that these incidents are dry runs for real attacks. They're first and foremost testing our systems, and if they can- they're softening up our defenses. The objective is clear: make sure all the little Ahmed Mohammads in this country can go anywhere they want with anything they want and anyone that says anything risks their job, social ostracism. Then, one day, when the time is right bombs start going off at schools all over the country. It's just like I said, Americans are going to wake up one day to the news that buses are blowing up all over the country, some have been hijacked, and the heads of little American infidels are being chucked out the back door as the buses roll down the road for the whole country to see. We'd better wake UP! What the hell.
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justme
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Post by justme on Sept 17, 2015 16:00:54 GMT -5
If you tallied the races of those that have attacked schools in the US, I'm pretty confident that white is far and away the number one race. Honestly I can't recall a school shooting/bombing/stabbing by a person with a Muslim name, though I admit I try not to commit the incidents to memory.
Plus, the photos of his clock were after the cops dismantled it. Lots of things stop looking like what they actually are once you start pulling it apart.
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Post by b2r on Sept 17, 2015 16:54:54 GMT -5
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Sept 17, 2015 17:15:50 GMT -5
If the kid has a history of doing things like this for attention, throw the book at him. Otherwise I have to agree with laterbloomer's assessment: they didn't consider this a legitimate threat and police involvement wasn't warranted. Generally speaking, wiring up a circuit board that a teacher plainly tells you "looks like a bomb" and showcasing it to the world smacks of stupidity (or igorance) in a post-911, post-Boston-Marathon world. Let us not forget the hue and cry that rang out from our board in response to the open carry crowd walking around town with assault rifles strapped to their backs. I recall a lot of "What kind of idiot..."'s in that case, and a Sudanese boy toting around a hand-crafted device indistinguishable from a time bomb isn't far off. You'd be surprised how quickly political correctness can go straight to hell when people think their lives are at stake. ETA: For those who say "This would never happen to a white kid." Fall of 1994: Virgil is 13 years old. 911 has yet to happen. Charlie Hebdo, Columbine, Sandy Hook, the Boston Marathon, the New Jihad: unknown. Virgil, a boy as white bread as they come, carries a do-it-yourself pushpin circuit board with an external battery pack to school intending to show it to his math teacher at the end of the day. In the first period of the day, he sets it on his desk to show some friends. The teacher notices it and asks him to put it into his bag. She quickly ferries him to the principal's office. The principal, who also happens to be Virgil's math teacher, takes one good look at it and comes to the same conclusion as the teacher: it looks like a homebrew "pipe bomb" with a timed electronic detonator. It won't be tolerated in the school. It will be confiscated. The board and battery pack will be returned to Virgil on two separate days. I'll grant you that they didn't involve my parents or the police, but there was no way on Earth they were going to tolerate something that looked like a bomb on the school grounds or on the school bus. So don't tell me this only ever happens to non-whites.
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justme
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Post by justme on Sept 17, 2015 17:25:21 GMT -5
I would think that if it was truly indistinguishable from a bomb, the police and school need training now on the proper way to handle bombs.
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Sept 17, 2015 17:39:17 GMT -5
I would think that if it was truly indistinguishable from a bomb, the police and school need training now on the proper way to handle bombs. If I had to guess, they knew perfectly well the device wasn't a bomb, but they believed it had been designed to look like one to the layman. I have no idea if that's a reasonable assumption or not. It would depend entirely on the boy's history.
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Sept 17, 2015 17:42:23 GMT -5
You guys aren't stupid, so stop acting like it. We all know the difference between an alarm clock and a bomb is the explosive. Any digital clock can be used to trigger an explosive agent, but lacking any actual explosive it's just a fucking clock. Oh noes a circuit board, it must be a bomb! Give me a fucking break. Have you opened the phone you carry with you at all times? There's a circuit board and wires in it. Same for your laptop, desktop, the smart board the teacher that confiscated the clock uses, etc. We're surrounded by circuit boards and wires. I don't know if you've looked at US achievement in math, science, and higher ed STEM enrollment lately, but the last thing this country needs is to be discouraging nerds that are in robotics club and like tinkering with simple electronics. #IStandWithAhmed If it has a battery pack on it (and many of these circuits do), it looks enough like an electronic timer hooked up to an explosive charge that it worries people. As my own experience shows, even people who know you don't mess around.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2015 19:30:00 GMT -5
Later can you link that on FB? I dont know how Paul lives in this world. George Tokei wrote an open letter to the boy that got in trouble and that was in the comments section.
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Opti
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Post by Opti on Sept 17, 2015 20:13:38 GMT -5
I understand he walked in with it in some cheap $10 case one can buy at Target. FWIW.
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Politically_Incorrect12
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Post by Politically_Incorrect12 on Sept 17, 2015 20:43:58 GMT -5
This is something I picked up on FB about this and it explains my thoughts very well
Kids actually get in trouble pretty frequently for a lot of things and in today's society, I'm guessing it's much more common for people to be overly cautious (zealous, or whatever other word you want to use). The same thing could have happened and I wonder if it would have even made news had it not been for the boys background. My guess is that it wasn't even the teacher who called the cops since it looks like it was much later in the day when the police came. It's a crappy situation all around...if the school does nothing and something happens, they get blamed for not looking into it sooner...if the school is overly cautious, it gets criticized for being stupid. I'm as guilty of it myself. So in our society that seems to be going more and more in the direction that if you have anything that might even remotely be considered to possibly be used for something that can cause destruction, you are going to get in trouble in school...what are they supposed to do or better yet, at what point is society overreacting?
I'm not saying I agree with how the school handled the situation.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2015 20:56:14 GMT -5
True, but the prejudices are pretty predictable. Girls get in trouble for dressing inappropriately, boys get in trouble for sexual behaviour, geeky kids get in trouble for things like piercings and hair cuts and Muslim kids get in trouble for junior terrorist type stuff.
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Politically_Incorrect12
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Post by Politically_Incorrect12 on Sept 17, 2015 21:17:33 GMT -5
True, but the prejudices are pretty predictable. Girls get in trouble for dressing inappropriately, boys get in trouble for sexual behaviour, geeky kids get in trouble for things like piercings and hair cuts and Muslim kids get in trouble for junior terrorist type stuff. Do prejudices include assuming that people react the way they do because it fits the profile (i.e. having the same reaction to a surburban white kid vs inner city black kid will produce different opinions about why the person reacted the way they did in any given situation)?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2015 21:47:53 GMT -5
True, but the prejudices are pretty predictable. Girls get in trouble for dressing inappropriately, boys get in trouble for sexual behaviour, geeky kids get in trouble for things like piercings and hair cuts and Muslim kids get in trouble for junior terrorist type stuff. Do prejudices include assuming that people react the way they do because it fits the profile (i.e. having the same reaction to a surburban white kid vs inner city black kid will produce different opinions about why the person reacted the way they did in any given situation)? I missed the story about the suburban white kid that got picked up by the police for making a clock, could you get me a link to that?
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Sept 17, 2015 22:17:48 GMT -5
Do prejudices include assuming that people react the way they do because it fits the profile (i.e. having the same reaction to a surburban white kid vs inner city black kid will produce different opinions about why the person reacted the way they did in any given situation)? I missed the story about the suburban white kid that got picked up by the police for making a clock, could you get me a link to that? I can give you a story about police shutting down a little girls' front yard lemonade stand, or a list of cities where the law now prohibits feeding and sheltering the homeless.
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Post by djAdvocate on Sept 17, 2015 23:31:20 GMT -5
THIS is what little Mohammad ACTUALLY walked into school with. The media is deliberately misleading the public about this issue. How about you try to get this through security at the Airport? Well, actually given our TSA, you'd probably succeed, but you know what I mean. Islamophobia? How many times have kids been sent home for chewing Pop Tarts into the shape of a gun-- but sending little Mohammad home with this is "Islamophobia"? townhall.com/columnists/jimhanson/2015/09/17/a-clock-or-a-bomb-trigger-n2053448 who cares if a 10 year old kid has a bomb trigger? it is useless without explosives. THAT is what they should be screening for, imo.
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Politically_Incorrect12
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Post by Politically_Incorrect12 on Sept 18, 2015 4:47:32 GMT -5
Do prejudices include assuming that people react the way they do because it fits the profile (i.e. having the same reaction to a surburban white kid vs inner city black kid will produce different opinions about why the person reacted the way they did in any given situation)? I missed the story about the suburban white kid that got picked up by the police for making a clock, could you get me a link to that? I doubt it would have made national news if the kid were a white suburban kid and the same thing happened, which is the point. I can't say the kids background didn't have anything to do with it, but a lot of people seem to be sure that's the only reason it happened. Even if they didn't think it was a bomb and thought it might possibly, even on the smallest level believe it to be a component that could be used for it and if they didn't turn it in, I can only imagine the outrage. Again, I'm not saying I agree with the way the school handled it; but Paul is right, kids have been getting in trouble for silly things for a while now.
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Politically_Incorrect12
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Post by Politically_Incorrect12 on Sept 18, 2015 4:49:18 GMT -5
THIS is what little Mohammad ACTUALLY walked into school with. The media is deliberately misleading the public about this issue. How about you try to get this through security at the Airport? Well, actually given our TSA, you'd probably succeed, but you know what I mean. Islamophobia? How many times have kids been sent home for chewing Pop Tarts into the shape of a gun-- but sending little Mohammad home with this is "Islamophobia"? townhall.com/columnists/jimhanson/2015/09/17/a-clock-or-a-bomb-trigger-n2053448 who cares if a 10 year old kid has a bomb trigger? it is useless without explosives. THAT is what they should be screening for, imo. I just saw this after I wrote my last response. It doesn't matter if there were no explosives, but if there is a the belief that it might possible be a component to a bomb, what are they supposed to do....let him just take it back home?
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imanangel
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Post by imanangel on Sept 18, 2015 5:56:38 GMT -5
I am more worried about white, male Americans shooting up places than I am of a 10 year old Muslim boy with a clock.
Seriously, if they REALLY were worried that it was a bomb, they did not handle the situation well at all. They never evacuated the building and they never called the bomb squad! But seriously, the thinking here is "if they are brown, they are either illegal or terrorists."
I have had students bring homemade clocks and stuff into the classroom before. I have never once looked at them and thought it was a bomb. Kids like to make cool things that can run with a few wires and batteries! He is a 10 year old little boy! Lord, I hate people sometimes.
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Tennesseer
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Post by Tennesseer on Sept 18, 2015 7:32:46 GMT -5
I am more worried about white, male Americans shooting up places than I am of a 10 year old Muslim boy with a clock. Seriously, if they REALLY were worried that it was a bomb, they did not handle the situation well at all. They never evacuated the building and they never called the bomb squad! But seriously, the thinking here is "if they are brown, they are either illegal or terrorists." I have had students bring homemade clocks and stuff into the classroom before. I have never once looked at them and thought it was a bomb. Kids like to make cool things that can run with a few wires and batteries! He is a 10 year old little boy! Lord, I hate people sometimes. We have a problem with anti-Muslim hysteria in our country when presidential candidates like Trump do nothing to publicly challenge ridiculous comments like the quoted comments below. Trump and others just feed the anti-Muslim hysteria along with all his and others other end-of-the-world nonsense if you don't elect him: Trump declines to correct man who says Obama is Muslim
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Sept 18, 2015 7:52:29 GMT -5
www.slate.com/blogs/schooled/2015/09/17/kiera_wilmot_arrest_florida_teenager_reacts_to_ahmed_mohamed_story.htmlTwo years before Ahmed Mohamed was arrested for bringing a homemade clock to his suburban Dallas high school, Kiera Wilmot, then 16, brought a science-fair experiment to her school in Bartow, Florida. After she mixed toilet-bowl cleaner and aluminum foil in a water bottle—an extremely popular YouTube science experiment (1,430 results right here)—the lid popped off and smoke poured out.
Though there were no injuries or property damage, administrators at Bartow High School contacted the police, who arrested Wilmot and led the 11th-grader, an honor student with no history of disciplinary problems, off in handcuffs. Sound familiar? “It was literally one week after the Boston bombing and I was being compared to the Boston bomber,” she told a local news station.Wilmot, who is black, was suspended for 10 days and recommended for expulsion. She was also charged with two felonies, though—after great public outcry—these charges were later dropped and her record expunged. After completing her junior year at an alternative high school for troubled kids, Wilmot returned to Bartow High School, which is 60 percent white, her senior year and graduated on time.
I spoke with Wilmot—now 19 and a sophomore at Florida Polytechnic University majoring in mechanical engineering—this morning about Mohamed’s predicament. She said that her first reaction was anger: “I honestly thought, ‘How could this happen to somebody else?’ ”
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Post by NoNamePerson on Sept 18, 2015 7:58:31 GMT -5
Did I miss the part about the Bomb Squad being called and the school being evacuated? Haven't read everything so maybe I did. Hell, we had bomb threats when I was in high school and that was back in the 60's and they evacuated immediately. Funny thing is the threats were called in during finals/exams the times we had them. ETA: Barely in the 60's in case someone checks my age and thinks I was still in hi school in 68 or 69
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Post by Deleted on Sept 18, 2015 8:13:28 GMT -5
I missed the story about the suburban white kid that got picked up by the police for making a clock, could you get me a link to that? I doubt it would have made national news if the kid were a white suburban kid and the same thing happened, which is the point. I can't say the kids background didn't have anything to do with it, but a lot of people seem to be sure that's the only reason it happened. Even if they didn't think it was a bomb and thought it might possibly, even on the smallest level believe it to be a component that could be used for it and if they didn't turn it in, I can only imagine the outrage. Again, I'm not saying I agree with the way the school handled it; but Paul is right, kids have been getting in trouble for silly things for a while now. 1. No, you don't get to say it's not being reported but it's happening. Any kid being arrested for taking a clock to school would hit the news tyvm.
2. We are back to the point I made about what different profiles get in trouble for. See post 19.
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