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Jan. 19th, 2002 08:54 pmHere is a scary scenario for you.
You're a college student temporarily housed in a hotel because you didn't get accepted into student housing early enough. You're forced to flee this temporary home when the World Trade Center towers are destroyed. You can't get back to your dorm room/hotel for weeks.
Then when you finally are able to return the FBI arrests you as you walk in the lobby.
You're repeated interrogated and told they know you had a radio used to communicate with pilots from the ground and that your room faces the twin towers. When you deny knowing anything about a radio you are charged with giving a false statement. They interrogate you over and over again throughout 30 days of captivity.
The "evidence" is enough to tie you to the Sept. 11 hijackers. I hope you said goodbye to your family before you left for college, because you might not live to see them again.
Then by luck someone sees a report that you've been charged and comes forward to give evidence that in fact that wasn't your radio. As it turns out, the radio was actually in the room one floor below yours. What a funny coincidence.
There is a term for this kind of round up/investigation: witch hunt.
The real victim of this scenario was an Egyptian student who was just trying to get his BS degree. The amazing thing is the guy actually forgives the American government! This is someone who had to go through all the same shit everyone else who lived in that neighborhood had to go through, then get thrown in jail and interrogated repeatedly.
The things that make this country worth preserving are definitely at stake here. Due process, the constitution, the bill of rights, the court system are the part of our nation that makes us different from the Taliban, The only reason those documents and systems mean anything is because we make them mean something. If we can ignore those guarantees for one group of people, how about the group you're in? We've gained a lot of civil rights over the last 40 years, lets not lose them all by deciding "other people" are not worthy of protection.
You're a college student temporarily housed in a hotel because you didn't get accepted into student housing early enough. You're forced to flee this temporary home when the World Trade Center towers are destroyed. You can't get back to your dorm room/hotel for weeks.
Then when you finally are able to return the FBI arrests you as you walk in the lobby.
You're repeated interrogated and told they know you had a radio used to communicate with pilots from the ground and that your room faces the twin towers. When you deny knowing anything about a radio you are charged with giving a false statement. They interrogate you over and over again throughout 30 days of captivity.
The "evidence" is enough to tie you to the Sept. 11 hijackers. I hope you said goodbye to your family before you left for college, because you might not live to see them again.
Then by luck someone sees a report that you've been charged and comes forward to give evidence that in fact that wasn't your radio. As it turns out, the radio was actually in the room one floor below yours. What a funny coincidence.
There is a term for this kind of round up/investigation: witch hunt.
The real victim of this scenario was an Egyptian student who was just trying to get his BS degree. The amazing thing is the guy actually forgives the American government! This is someone who had to go through all the same shit everyone else who lived in that neighborhood had to go through, then get thrown in jail and interrogated repeatedly.
The things that make this country worth preserving are definitely at stake here. Due process, the constitution, the bill of rights, the court system are the part of our nation that makes us different from the Taliban, The only reason those documents and systems mean anything is because we make them mean something. If we can ignore those guarantees for one group of people, how about the group you're in? We've gained a lot of civil rights over the last 40 years, lets not lose them all by deciding "other people" are not worthy of protection.
