Muslim student 'kicked off flight for speaking Arabic' sues Southwest Airlines

[SummerMadness]

Muslim student 'kicked off flight for speaking Arabic' sues Southwest Airlines

A Muslim student who was ejected from a Southwest Airlines plane after speaking Arabic has filed a lawsuit alleging racial discrimination.

Khairuldeen Makhzoomi was "publicly humiliated," searched and interrogated for hours after being removed from the flight before take-off at Los Angeles International Airport.

 

[Hieronymus]

People must have complained and felt unsafe, so they decided to remove him.
But why did they feel unsafe with that young man on board?
Any video footage of this event?

 

[SummerMadness]

People must have complained and felt unsafe, so they decided to remove him.
But why did they feel unsafe with that young man on board?
Any video footage of this event?

They felt safe because he spoke Arabic.

 

[dzheremi]

We a thread on this back when it originally happened. It was ridiculous and insulting then, and it still is. I hope he sues the pants off them.

 

[Dave-W]

They felt safe because he spoke Arabic.

I think you mean UNsafe. And since when is a language "racial?"

 

[SummerMadness]

I think you mean UNsafe. And since when is a language "racial?"

Ah yes, the common tactic to split hairs in an effort to deny racial discrimination, this is the same argument made when someone denies discrimination against Hispanics is not racism because Hispanic is a culture, yet the target is chosen because of their skin color. His skin color and appearance are why he was targeted, just as Sikhs and Indians are murdered because people believe them to be Muslim. "But that's religion?!" It is religion, but victims are singled out because of their skin color.

 

[dzheremi]

This is true. Bosniaks, Albanians, and other white Muslims would not get singled out like this, though they also do not speak Arabic, so perhaps that's part of it. I think Americans have been sort of trained by this point to see Arabic as a scary brown person's language, which...ughhh...دماغسز...

The same thing happens to Christians, by the way, if they happen to be Middle Eastern, even if they are not Arab-identifying or Arabic speakers. Here is a story of a Chaldean Catholic woman from Iraq who was nearly beaten to death in Albuquerque, NM (Chaldean Catholics traditionally speak Neo-Aramaic as a native language, not Arabic) while I lived there. This happened in the same area of town where several parishioners of my church lived, including one who had moved there because his neighbor at the previous house was a crazy lady who threatened to call the NSA on him because she thought he was a terrorist. His name was George, and he was a deacon in the Church who had come to America about three years earlier from Egypt to get a computer science degree; not scary at all, but events like this put everyone on edge whether they're Muslim or not, for sadly obvious and sensible reasons.

This brainless fear of everything and everyone who even seems Muslim to dumb people has to stop. It's not illegal to be Muslim (or non-Muslim, but from the Middle East) in America, but treatment like what this guy got from Southwest Airlines ought to be.

 

[DaisyDay]

This is true. Bosniaks, Albanians, and other white Muslims would not get singled out like this, though they also do not speak Arabic, so perhaps that's part of it. I think Americans have been sort of trained by this point to see Arabic as a scary brown person's language, which...ughhh...دماغسز...

The same thing happens to Christians, by the way, if they happen to be Middle Eastern, even if they are not Arab-identifying or Arabic speakers. Here is a story of a Chaldean Catholic woman from Iraq who was nearly beaten to death in Albuquerque, NM (Chaldean Catholics traditionally speak Neo-Aramaic as a native language, not Arabic) while I lived there. This happened in the same area of town where several parishioners of my church lived, including one who had moved there because his neighbor at the previous house was a crazy lady who threatened to call the NSA on him because she thought he was a terrorist. His name was George, and he was a deacon in the Church who had come to America about three years earlier from Egypt to get a computer science degree; not scary at all, but events like this put everyone on edge whether they're Muslim or not, for sadly obvious and sensible reasons.

This brainless fear of everything and everyone who even seems Muslim to dumb people has to stop. It's not illegal to be Muslim (or non-Muslim, but from the Middle East) in America, but treatment like what this guy got from Southwest Airlines ought to be.

How do you stop stupid? Especially with the example from the "Leader of the Free World"

 

[dzheremi]

You might not be able to stop stupid, but some education can go a long way. For instance, knowing that by self identification (the Zoghby Institute, 2002; the numbers have not changed all that much since then, though I couldn't find a reliable source for the newer numbers, so I'm going with this), 63% of Arab-Americans identify as Christian and 24% as Muslim would probably do quite a bit to reshape some people's automatic reaction of "That guy/gal is speaking Arabic, therefore they are automatically an eeeevil Muslim terrorist who is up to something."

Simple things. Baby steps.

 

[MyOwnSockPuppet]

Muslim student 'kicked off flight for speaking Arabic' sues Southwest Airlines

Quite right too, him sueing that is, but at least it wasn't United (for a change).

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

Quite right too, him sueing that is, but at least it wasn't United (for a change).

That was my thought too - maybe US airlines are spreading the stupid around...

 

[Ana the Ist]

Ah yes, the common tactic to split hairs in an effort to deny racial discrimination, this is the same argument made when someone denies discrimination against Hispanics is not racism because Hispanic is a culture, yet the target is chosen because of their skin color. His skin color and appearance are why he was targeted, just as Sikhs and Indians are murdered because people believe them to be Muslim. "But that's religion?!" It is religion, but victims are singled out because of their skin color.

It's not really splitting hairs to insist that an incident that had nothing to do with race isn't racist.

The fact is, if Muslims weren't known for hijacking airplanes for terrorist attacks...this probably never would've happened.

That's not to say the airline was right...they weren't...but that doesn't mean it's racist.

 

[dzheremi]

"Race" is perhaps not the most precise word, as there Arabic-speakers of many different backgrounds, not all of which accept being classified together with the dominant Arab-Muslim population on the account of their being forced to speak Arabic as a result of conquest. Yet it's certainly ethnic discrimination, insofar as it is assumed that because he is speaking Arabic therefore he's surely up to some nefarious activity.

As I meant to show with my post, this kind of thing affects lots of people who just happen to be existing in the 'wrong' place while being Middle Eastern, not even specifically Muslim. At the same time, it's a bit naive to assume that the same would've happened to a person of Slavic, Scandinavian, or another 'white' background, even if they were likewise practicing Muslims and speaking their own language (as millions of Slavic Muslims do, and have for centuries).

These Bosniak girls are far less likely to get thrown off a plane that the average Iraqi Arabic-speaker, despite being no less Muslim than the man this story is about. And of course Bosniaks have most definitely been involved in jihadist movements recently, so I don't know...maybe it's time to throw Bosniaks (or even more, Kosovar Albanians) off of planes too, if race really plays no part in this?

Somehow I don't see that happening.

 

[jardiniere]

How do you stop stupid? Especially with the example from the "Leader of the Free World"

Stupid is incurable, only ignorance is curable.

 

[MyOwnSockPuppet]

Stupid is incurable, only ignorance is curable.

Possibly an extended course of retrophrenology?

 

[Landon Caeli]

We a thread on this back when it originally happened. It was ridiculous and insulting then, and it still is. I hope he sues the pants off them.

He's going to lose the case because they pulled him aside because an Arabic flight attendant heard him say 'the martyrs' in Arabic. Which was a red flag.

...It was not "racism". It was because of what he said.

 

[Landon Caeli]

It's not really splitting hairs to insist that an incident that had nothing to do with race isn't racist.

The fact is, if Muslims weren't known for hijacking airplanes for terrorist attacks...this probably never would've happened.

That's not to say the airline was right...they weren't...but that doesn't mean it's racist.

It certainly wasn't racism. Unless we think Arabs singling out Arabs can be considered racism... Because thats exactly what happened on this flight.

 

[dzheremi]

He's going to lose the case because they pulled him aside because an Arabic flight attendant heard him say 'the martyrs' in Arabic. Which was a red flag.

According to the link in the OP, the flight attendant asked him why he was speaking Arabic on the plane, and it was the later investigators who said that he said something about "the martyrs", while he insists he was saying "inshallah" ("martyrs" in Arabic is el shuhada'...they don't sound very similar to me).

There is nothing to suggest that the flight attendant or any passenger heard him say anything about martyrs.

 

[FenderTL5]

..63% of Arab-Americans identify as Christian and 24% as Muslim would probably do quite a bit to reshape some people's automatic reaction of "That guy/gal is speaking Arabic, therefore they are automatically an eeeevil Muslim terrorist who is up to something."

Simple things. Baby steps.

I suppose there's a few that'd lose their minds if they were to visit our church and hear prayers recited in Arabic.

 

[Landon Caeli]

According to the link in the OP, the flight attendant asked him why he was speaking Arabic on the plane, and it was the later investigators who said that he said something about "the martyrs", while he insists he was saying "inshallah" ("martyrs" in Arabic is el shuhada'...they don't sound very similar to me).

There is nothing to suggest that the flight attendant or any passenger heard him say anything about martyrs.

From the article:

Minutes after hanging up the phone, Mr Makhzoomi said, he was “singled out” and removed from the flight by two police officers and Southwest employee Shoaib Ahmed.

So the Arab employee escorted him out and questioned him. Seems to suggest he was listening to the conversation, as an Arabic speaker himself.