Airport Profiling

Submitted by John R (United States), Aug 24, 2006 at 18:59

One politician in Wisconsin and two in New York State came out in favor of similar profiling. A Fox News anchor, Bill O'Reilly, has suggested that Muslim passengers ages 16 to 45 "all should be spoken with." Mike Gallagher, one of the most popular American radio talk-show hosts, has said he wants "a Muslim-only [passenger] line" at airports. In a column for the Evening Bulletin, Robert Sandler proposed putting "Muslims on one plane and put the rest of us on a different one."

Quite frankly Dr. Pipes, ... I find these debatable. I struggle on this topic. What about your opinion? You say so much about what people say in this article yet you really do not say what you believe in with regard to these. Perhaps you are undecided like me. Is it right to implement such things? Muslims on different planes, Muslims 16-45 spoken with at airport lines, Muslim only passenger lines? I believe in some type of racial profiling but I do not know about these. Maybe racial profiling like more camera focus on Muslims, heck I do not know I am undecided....

John R.

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Daniel Pipes replies:

I did give my view in the article: "such notions as "Muslim-only lines" at airports are infeasible; rather, intelligence must drive efforts to root out Muslims with an Islamist agenda."