What did you do?

Ahmed Mohamed, 14, shows a photographer some of the electronics components in the bedroom that doubles as his workshop at his family’s Irving home. At left is Ahmed’s 3-year-old sister, Fatima Mohamed.

There is no doubt that Ahmed Mohamed is a smart guy. He “create” a clock assembling some electronic stuffs at only 14, while most of our kids are, more or less, able to chat and write silliness on Facebook.

But his story is quite interesting, you can find on the web a lot on this.

To make a long story short apparently the guy bring the handmade clock to school, waiting for praise and compliments. The teacher instead call the police, and the little boy is arrested, handcuffed and brought to prison.

Now let be clear here, I have some hard times reading the news to believe that someone could really thought the boy was bringing a bomb to school. I understand that this can be hard to believe, come on he is muslin and brown, but only a moron could have thought the gear was a bomb. beside if they were really thinking the boy was bringing a bomb they managed it in the most crazy, stupid way possible.

if you really are suspecting it is a bomb you call bomb squad, evacuate the building and take extraordinary precautions instead of waiting in a room with the kid and the bomb for the police to come, bring the kid handcuffed in the car with the bomb, and take pictures.

So it seem quite clear to me that the incompetence level showed by the English teacher, the police and the community is overwhelming. Even if we don’t want to make claims on islamophobia or racism the overall episode scream “dumb” and “danger” not because of the kid clock but because of the way this thing have been managed by the adults. I would be not feel secure knowing that a suspect bomb would be managed that way by police. it that would have been a real bomb it could have turned on a massacre.

But if they didn’t thought it was a bomb, so why all this? why taking the kid handcuffed, while all those rumors? did they wanted to show their white pride in front of the world?

I am not thinking they wanted purposely do a demonstrative act against muslin community, brown people, but , worse, they did the silliest and easiest equation:

muslin + electronic handmade gear = bomb

The homemade digital clock that led to Ahmed Mohamed's arrest — The homemade digital clock that led to Ahmed Mohamed’s arrest (Irving Police Department)

and they managed it in the worst way possible because they simply didn’t care, and don’t know how to handle this. They didn’t care if something will stay in the kid records, they didn’t even care to look stupid to the people who analyze this thing, since they know most of the people will simply stop to the first title of the first news (kid arrested for a hoax bomb) or the silliest justification as we did to protect the people.

The truth alas is quite different, if this is the way the protect people I would be really scared, because if something here is clear is the incredible sequence of dumb act performed there by the ones who should protect people.

A bunch of very stupid acts:

Stupid for how they handled a “suspect” risky situation, jeopardizing all people around, this is not how you deal with a bomb
Stupid because if they realized the bomb was not a bomb they should have questioned the teacher, since the boy never claimed it was a bomb but always claimed it was a hand-made electronic watch (which is not so dangerous, I suppose). Beside I am wondering how a hoax bomb should look like
Stupid because they do not protected the identity and the privacy of a kid, exposing him and his family to a useless ordeal, the pictures of the kid in handcuff will stay on the net for ever, and not sure about any records on his arrest and detention

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/here-is-the-diy-clock-that-a-muslim-teen-was-arrested-for-bringing-to-school

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/09/texas-ninth-grader-arrested-for-building-clock.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/17/us/texas-student-is-under-police-investigation-for-building-a-clock.html?_r=0

http://anonhq.com/racial-prejudice-in-america-a-young-christian-inventor-is-a-hero-a-muslim-is-a-terrorist/

http://skydancingblog.com/2015/09/17/thursday-reads-istandwithahmed/