profiling.

sometimes, i read commentary, and i cringe at the display of imprecise thinking being presented as truth, the disingenuity presented as self-awareness of the most honest sort. it is hard work, this providing commentary struggling with troubling issues in the world justifying one's own bigotry. the struggle for most paid commentators, it seems to me, is one of how best to present the irrationality of bigotry as the objective truth. it is so convincing, that i have to remind myself sometimes that i am not crazy, that my friends have to remind me that what is crazy is what is being presented as truth.

i was told recently, "all muslims aren't terrorists, but it is unfortunate that all terrorists are muslims". this is, of course, what we are being told on a daily basis, sometimes with subtlety, most of the time not. to question this very basic assumption is to raise suspicions from those around you. although i expect very little from people of either the right or the left variety, the discouragement compounds as i realize that courage is so loosely defined as to be rendered effectively meaningless - as in, does a rubber band have a purpose if you take away its elasticity?

courage these days is used to describe questioning of not the fact that we are engaged in policies of systematically taking away rights of members of certain groups, conceiving of more and more laws that can be used retroactively, hoping to assuage the fear of the powerful majority by exponentially increasing the fears of everyone else. rather, courage these days is defined when people thoughtfully consider which profiling is acceptable in which circumstances. which is to say, thoughtful people seem to agree that as long as policy is not intentionally racist, racism as a byproduct is something that no one has to like, but must be acceptable considering the circumstances. to disagree is to be hopelessly naive, or even worse, a traitor.

in other words, there is a price to be paid for security. many people seem to be willing to accept that price, but i wonder if they would hesitate a bit more if they were the ones actually paying that price. in britain, a brazilian man was shot 8 times in point-blank range because he looked like he could have been a terrorist. no one asked him if he was willing to pay that price so that others could see that anti-terror forces were doing their jobs, shooting to kill, and sometimes mistakes are made, but that is the price for white security. in a world of majority rule, the majority has dictated that that price is acceptable. indeed, the fact that he tried to run away displays his guilt of something - of what, we're not quite sure, but certainly he was no ingenue.

on the other hand, white men find the us-canadian border conveniently porous for their purposes; post-war stress explains civilian violence for this marine of the year; trying to smuggle a bomb onto a plane is emptied of the symbolism of hate if it occurs in oklahoma, a reaction that seems incredibly mild considering the state's experience with the boy next door; the most outrage we've managed to muster around the eric rudolph case is the supposedly unfair implication to supreme court nominee john roberts, jr; and shooting a gun is a good way to let off some steam. how much more evidence do we need that profiling is just bad policy?

i wonder how much it will take before we demand an interrogation of white male privilege that serves to legitimize the highest incidences of violence internationally. when are we going to hold white men accountable for this violence that is systematic? when are we going to stop pretending that violence is radical?