According to the Associated Press, an American Airlines flight was grounded after passengers complained about 6 men who were speaking Arabic. The men had been hired by a company called Defense Training Systems to train Marines at Camp Pendleton.
American Airlines spokesperson Tim Wagner said that local law enforcement was called in to question the men but the TSA did not get involved. He also said that passenger traveling with two small children got into an argument with the men, but declined to say what it was about.
[Dave Stephens from Defense Training Systems] said some passengers complained after hearing the men speak in Arabic, but he declined to elaborate.
“I wish I could say more because I have personal feelings but this is what I’m allowed to say,” he said.
The plane returned to the terminal at 11:26 p.m. and was held overnight because of an 11:30 p.m. curfew at Lindbergh Field. The were 126 passengers booked on the flight.
The flight left San Diego Wednesday morning and arrived in Chicago in the afternoon.
People, let’s try to behave ourselves on the airplane? Shall we?
Plane bound for Chicago held after dispute involving Arabic-speaking men [Chicago Tribune]
(Photo:Kurmbox)
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@not_seth_brundle:
If I read that press release right, it says, “we thank the 6 Iraqi men who help us to more effectively occupy their former country, and kill our mutual enemy’s…in combat”
@GuruSteve: “She got nervous and wanted to get off, should they have prevented her from getting off the plane? Not allowed her to complain?”
I say no to the second question, but yes to the first. In fact, I would go so far as to say that she and/or AA should have to pay a fine for having caused the flight delay if her complaint really was only that they were speaking Arabic. The flight was supposed to take off Tuesday night but because of her unreasonable nervousness and AA’s pandering it didn’t take off until the following morning and arrived in the afternoon. That is a huge disruption to all the passengers on the flight who had to sleep in the airport or secure accommodations nearby. Business travelers undoubtedly missed important meetings or court appearances. All because people were speaking Arabic and it freaked Mommy out. I don’t think she should be able to delay over a hundred passengers without there being some kind of consequence.
@Buran:
I think people sometimes are concerned with the content of the site, since the site’s reputation, and therefore usefulness/power rest on it. Thus, if all posts become “china poison train,” “airlines are evil,” and “the RIAA hunts down people who are generally doing something illegal”……then letting a company know they made it onto the site won’t do a single thing for resolving the issue.
Who cares about the complaints about a company when the site that posts them has a reputation of crap?
@bedofnails: “It’s interesting to read these comments, and not wonder if every single one of you, would not at least do a double take or raise an eyebrow seeing 6 Iraqi men (middle-eastern) waiting in line for your flight, speaking a language unknown to you.”
It’s a fair point, and one that shouldn’t be ignored. I think that most of us would be unlikely to escalate that raised eyebrow into a full-blown altercation, which is why there is a general sense that a big piece is missing from this story.
“Where the story doesn’t make sense/jive – if they are liaisons to the US government and US soldiers they obviously all know English, (unless our military is just plucking any Iraqi residing in the US to elaborate on their former culture) why raise irrational unjustified fears for no reason?”
I can’t get on board with this, though. It isn’t the Arabic-speakers’ responsibility to mollycoddle irrational fear; it is their fellow travelers’ responsibility to deal with their emotions in a civil manner. (I realize that you meant your comment in a practical sense, not an idealistic one; my reply is offered that way as well.)
Shit, I think the terrorists have won. All you have to do is get six dark skinned guys together (make sure there are six, because that’s a key number according to commenters here), have them speak in Arabic (actually, does it even matter what they speak?). Do this often enough, you can easily paralyze the US airspace.
@not_seth_brundle:
What about the hundreds of thousands of missed appointments, birthdays, court appearances, anniversaries of the 2,974 that happen to go to work in New York 6 years ago?
Precaution never kills anyone, as annoying as it may be, those people here in San Diego still get to wake up the next day.
@Nemesis_Enforcer:
In Poland it’s OK to speak German, but not English?
2007 – 1939 = 68 years
So I guess the answer is, in 2069, you can speak Arabic on a plane.
@HeyHermano:
I wouldnt consider that a valid comparison.
Now IF the woman went to talk to security personnel about said man that gaves her reasonable cause to be wary/suspicious…. that’s a different story. In THIS day & age (post 9/11)… it is not beyond reason IMO.
Hell! With the current pedophile scares in today’s society I have even had people call the cops on me for sitting in my car in a park’s parking lot (I was eating my lunch on my lunch break). I cant blame them if parents feel a bit wary about a middle-aged man sitting in a parked car in a park (seemingly doing nothing)… ESPECIALLY with the current “pedophiles are everywhere just waiting to snatch your child!” mindset foisted upon us by sensationalist news stories (to catch a predator anyone?).
@Johnny:
Well said Johnny.
Oh boy, are the freepers here again?
@bedofnails: I don’t understand these comments about them speaking arabic. I work for a company that’s owned by a French bank, ergo, we have a lot of French speaking people here. Should I get nervous when they all sit around speaking French (when I know perfectly well that they all know English)? No. It’s their right to speak what ever language they want to. They could be speaking pig latin for all I care. I saw this story early this morning in the Trib, and I’m sure there’s a lot more to it. But to say that they in someway brought this on themselves because they were speaking Arabic is insane.
@kittikin: Welcome to America, kid.
In my mind it went down like this
Arabic Speaking Men: “Blah blah blah”
Nervous Woman: Oh my God honey, there’s terrorists on this plane!
Arabic Speaking Man: “Mind your own business there’s no law against speaking your own language in this country, yet.”
Nervous Woman: “Get me off this plane! We’re all going to die! 9/11!”
Rest of Passengers: “Oh fuck.” (they all simultaneously punch buttons on cell phones)”Hi, I’m going to be delayed. No, I don’t think I’ll be there today.”
…speaking a language unknown to you…
Perhaps it is from living where I do but someone speaking a foreign language just doesn’t bother me. That’s every day for me. It’s all background noise. I’m not going to become afraid of someone I wasn’t afaid of before just because they start speaking something other than English.
Where the story doesn’t make sense/jive – if they are liaisons to the US government and US soldiers they obviously all know English, (unless our military is just plucking any Iraqi residing in the US to elaborate on their former culture) why raise irrational unjustified fears for no reason?
@bedofnails: That doesn’t make English their first language. It doesn’t even mean their English is that good.
If you have two or more people together who’s first language isn’t English guess what? They aren’t going to speak to each other in English.
@bedofnails:, @Nemesis_Enforcer: Having lived and worked in a country where my native tongue (English) is not the local one, I can assure you that it is very easy when speaking to someone from “home” to slip into your native tongue, even if you’re fluent in the local language. The example about the bar in Poland is a perfect case in point. Do you somehow think it’s ok that you felt the need to run out of the bar for speaking a phrase or sentence in English? Do you think it would be ok for me to feel like I had to leave a restaurant here in the US because I answered a call from a friend overseas and spoke to him in Italian? (never mind the cell-phone-in-public cracks, let’s assume I’m not shouting into the phone.)
Saying this is OK because that’s “how it is” is akin to whites in the old South thinking it was OK to discriminate against blacks because that was “how it was.” It’s bad enough that we’ve developed a reputation worldwide as a nation of narrow-minded, poorly-educated war mongers (thanks W), we don’t have to say the attitudes and behaviors that reinforce that reputation are OK.
@bedofnails: Yes, by all means, throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Listen, if dark people, oops, I meant a group of *six* dark men talking in strange tongue make you nervous, then don’t fly and save the rest of us the trouble. How’s that for precautions?
@Johnny:
But I think it IS their responsibility to reasonably conform to the current situation. That means, to NOT bring attention to themselves. AND to understand that a group of middleeasterners traveling on a US flight will make people nervous. IF I aproached a woman in a dark parking garage…. should I not expect her to have her finger on the mace button?
@HeyHermano: They left out that the men were questioned and released but added that it was a woman and that she said they had “odd behavior”.
“Odd behavior” – That’s so wonderfully vauge. We don’t even know if the odd behavior was speaking a different language or something separate.
Everyone knows that the captain should have made them all strip down to their underwear, put bags over their heads and made them form a pyramid. After all, everyone that speaks Arabic is a terrorist.
Yes there’s probably two sides to this story, but unless the other side was speaking extremely loud, the flight was delayed for a dumb reason.
Thank goodness they were just speaking Arabic and not spreading flour… Oh the horror…
@GearheadGeek: @WindowSeat: @melking1972:
I understand and agree with all of your points regarding “native languages”, etc. Although I would like to avoid the “this is America, speak English dammit” black hole; I’m assuming these are intelligent men, obviously sensitive to the current level of fear and irrationality associated with their ethnicity and origin.
It’s impossible to predict how others (a plane load of Americans in this case) will perceive your actions and words, but something certainly must be said for sensitivity to the situation at hand.
That said, it also sounds like the woman and child referenced took their fears to the next level. I wasn’t there, it’s impossible to speculate; however in the end it appears even though they were all delayed for 10 hours, it all worked out and everyone got where they were going safely.
@spinachdip:
They don’t make me nervous, as long as they don’t have box cutters.
@nctrnlboy: Ooooookay wow thats one hell of a leap for an analogy. Lets break that down shall we:
person dressed as a bank robber = probably a bank robber.
Arabs speaking their language in a public setting = grounds to suspect terrorism.
Look I know you are skittish but come on people. FFS people let me break this down for you, ARABIC IS NOT A RELIGION OR ORGANIZATION. For that matter terrorists are worldwide and have different ideologies. If it is skin color or religion you are looking at that idiotic. Every single skin color, religion, and economic class has produced terrorists through out the centuries (wow really omg there were non Arabic terrorists centuries before 9-11?!?). Lets all remember as Americans we have produced our fair share of terrorists and blown up our fair share of buildings/offices (and not just Mcveigh). Talk to the Japanese or Irish/English next time you think terrorists are only Arab speaking.
Hopefully there is much more to this story. Honestly, you cannot ask a group of people to avoid speaking their own language in public in hopes of settling the nerves of xenophobic people. I grew up in DC and many of my friends growing up were Persian and spoke Farsi. I happen to be half Jewish (though not religious), I don’t consider myself particularly PC. I have been exposed to other groups of people and cultures and as a result, I don’t heckle people for speaking their own freaking language when it is not my own. If the story is just an issue of a couple of Americans freaking out over flying with Arabs, then honestly, those Americans should bury their heads in the sand and avoid flying anywhere, ever.
@Johnny: If that’s what the “behave” comment was about, then it should be clarified. Standing alone, it looks like it is a response to what language was being spoken.
@bedofnails: People can’t exactly control their nationality, so telling them to be “sensitive” about it is silly. We should instead be considerate of the fact that there is more to this world than stereotypical American-Idol-worshipping me-first SUV-driving America.
Really shows you have far we have to go in some parts of the country. Go live in a city where you interact with “Arab looking” people everyday. Then its not so shocking when you realize that sometimes these scary people also need to get places by airplane.
If the article is taken at face value, the men speaking Arabic were punished for someone else’s ignorance. I have to say, I’m just glad I don’t look or speak Arabic.
@nctrnlboy:
What exactly is “the current situation”? A state of paranoid xenophobia that views all people of Arab/Middle Eastern descent as potential terrorists? Why exactly is it their responsibilty to conform to that? Why is it not the responsibility of the average American traveler to realize that there are thousands (millions?) of Muslims living in America who are not terrorists?
As far as your analogy about women with their finger on the mace button – I have no problem with her putting her finger on the button, so long as the can stays in her pocket/purse/whatever. When she pulls it out and points it in my face – or even sprays it – simply because she thinks I might be a threat – she’s in the wrong.
I would actually assume that, these days, an Arab terrorist group would a) select the whitest-looking guys possible to send onto a plane, b) instruct them to speak only English, and c) caution them not to do anything that might possibly arouse suspicion, including going to the bathroom, leaving their seatbelts unbuckled, and/or looking at people funny.
A bunch of dark-skinned guys speaking Arabic are probably not going to be terrorists, precisely because they’re too obvious and the likelihood of them getting kicked off the plane is so high.
I think security concerns aren’t doing anything(statement a bit exaggerated), trying to maintain AND raise the standards* (moral/education) of the US will. I wonder why nobody tries this….. If I own an advertising company, I’d run an an ad in the entire D.C. area advertising this……(provided I won’t go broke for doing this).
If people are smart I think they can detect REAL suspicious behavior, not just “OMG, he’s talking Arabic”. Whatever way you put it, this is a situation of discrimination where everyone (who can turn this situation around) is quiet, even the victims ["I wish I could say more because I have personal feelings but this is what I'm allowed to say," he said.]. So much for freedom of speech.
I know a few people who have been discriminated by how they speak their language.
The laws are starting to get really {un}effective these days. How many years does it take for people to realize this. Everyone always considers the law to be the problem, but in reality it’s fine BUT no one’s enforcing them so anyone can take advantage (even unknowingly).
@Buran:
I call bull-shit, when an American flys to a foreign country, it’s always with a sense of sensitivity to their surroundings.
@CumaeanSibyl: Exactly, no white college students have ever gone to the training camps. Nope, didn’t happen, nu uh, not seeing any, didn’t find any in Afghanistan or anything, nooooppers totally safe on the front.
Now lets go find those people shouting ALAHA ACHBAR MOHOOOOMUD JIHAD!!!!! ALLLLAAAAHHAAALLAAAA!!!!
The situation seems logical A woman hears a number of arabic speaking men talking near her on a plane. She says something to the American Airlines steward about this. She says they are behaving oddly. Maybe they are having a disagreement, or maybe they had 4 martinis before the flight, or maybe they were mixing the word “Bush” in the concersation, who knows.
The men hear the woman talking to the steward and confront her. The steward is unable to defuse the situation. The woman wants off the plane. Others may have expressed their opinion (who knows which side they were on). American Airlines decides not to fly — either there was too much commosion — or they believed the woman, that the men were acting oddly.
Why all the hubbub? American Airlines should have had more control, or in fact may a security decision which they are now regretting.
@Egakino:
BUT the current situation (in this country) IS with middleeastern terrorists. NOT IRA & other known terrorist groups. That means, groups of middleeastern men on a flight will be looked at with suspicion (and will make people uncomfortable… & possibly even make them want to deplane). Its just the reality of the current situation. Yeah, it is idealistically wrong/unfair, but it is reality.
If there were bands of mexicans firebombing subways (just an example) in various cities…. would it not be reasonable to be wary of groups of mexicans in subways? Or is that just racist? :rolleyes:
And what is so wrong with erring on the side of caution?
You know… not all middle-aged overweight men who are alone by himself in a park (where parents & kids are/frequent) are not pedophiles…. but is it unrealistic to expect some overprotective parents to suspect I am? And possibly inform the police? SHould I be pissed because it happens when I know full well the current state of “pedophiles are everywhere” fear mentality here in the US? You have to reasonably understand the current situation & either refrain from activity that will scare people (irrational or not) or just deal with the consequenses. I realize that if I am alone in a park… there is a possibility that some overprotective parent will call the cops on me. I can either stay away from parks or deal with the consequenses (being cops checking me out)… yeah it sucks… but it is the reality of the situation. I accept that. Middleastern traveling on US flights should as well.
@bedofnails: Ha! That’s a good one. Ever been to Prague in the summer?
@sncreducer:
But it IS the way the world currently is. Running around with a dumb expression on your face, pointing out supposed injustices is useless. We get it, their are millions of Muslims (btw, lots of words being uncomfortably interchangeably here, muslim, arab, middle-eastern, all which have drastically different meanings.) in the world. We get it, New Orleans has a lot of blacks in the poverty level, politicians usually come from money, they take money from lobbyists, etc.
Although these are amazingly cognitive observations, pointing out that people shouldn’t be afraid of a group based on their language or appearance is off base – what that women was afraid of was that her plane was going to be over taken by 6 Iraqi men. This is not an unjustified fear.
@bedofnails: “what that women was afraid of was that her plane was going to be over taken by 6 Iraqi men. This is not an unjustified fear.” I saw nothing that indicated that the 6 men were not allowed to travel on the flight the next morning. It did not explode. It was not flown into a building. As near as we can tell at this point it was not used to sprinkle some biological warfare agent along the route between San Diego and Chicago. This would indicate that the it was EXACTLY an unjustified fear.
@nctrnlboy:
“If there were bands of mexicans firebombing subways (just an example) in various cities…. would it not be reasonable to be wary of groups of mexicans in subways? Or is that just racist? :rolleyes:”
If you describe Meixcans as a race and not a nationality, what you are describing is the definition of racism. [www.answers.com] However, this is America you are free to be as bigoted as you want in your own mind. Once you start acting on your irrational fears thats when it becomes a problem. Thats when you are deciding your views/rights supersede those of another race of people.
Its also pretty astounding you can think you can’t go to a park alone whenever you want. Thats pretty paranoid. You are innocent until proven guilty. If a parent called the cops on me for simply going to a park alone I’d laugh my ass off.
@Hossofcourse: If they were drinking martinis, that should actually calm her fears that they were Muslim extremists.
“But it IS the way the world currently is. Running around with a dumb expression on your face, pointing out supposed injustices is useless.”
You’re right we’ll get nowhere, socially, by pointing our problems in society. We should just accept things as they are. Thats how we solved colonialism, slavery, unequal suffrage, etc. People always had reasons why these traditions should continue, yet we were able to move past them because we were first able to recognize them as a problem.
“pointing out that people shouldn’t be afraid of a group based on their language or appearance is off base”
This is not off base. In our society racism and discrimination are NOT socially acceptable. Therefore, it should not be socially acceptable to be afraid of on the basis of people on the basis of the way they look or which language they speak.
“that women was afraid of was that her plane was going to be over taken by 6 Iraqi men. This is not an unjustified fear.”
Please justify this fear to me. How is it rational to fear that men from Iraq pose an imminent threat to the safety of US air travel?
Bottom line is this. You are rationalizing the discrimination of a largely unrepresented minority.
.
@nctrnlboy:
“What is so wrong with erring on the side of caution?”
OK, no problem. I think all rich executives are corporate criminals (plenty of evidence to back THAT up). So their finances should all be completely opened to government scrutiny.
I think christian conservatives want to blow up abortion clinics (again, plenty of evidence for that). So we should be able to search their homes for explosives and weapons at will, without warrants.
I think white men are all potential serial killers and rapists (again, look at the statistics). So we should have them under 24/7 surveillance.
Still think there’s nothing wrong with “erring on the side of caution”?
Same ? to you, bedofnails.
@GearheadGeek:
Huh? By your reasoning, suspicion, and prevention are absurd unless an incident occurs.
I’m no longer wearing a condom, because the last time I didn’t, nothing happened.
@sncreducer:
I wouldn’t know, I am not a conservative, or a serial killer (I think.)
@nctrnlboy: Yes i say it is unresonable because yet again I have to spell this out for you ARABIC IS NOT A RELIGION OR ORGANIZATION. Beyond that if you think that people who speak Arabic are the only terrorist organizations that what to do us harm then you far beyond anything I can help you with. It happens that Muslim terroists (see what I did there – that is a sect of belief within a religion not a language spoken worldwide) were JUST the last ones to hit us. Last time I checked as soon as the planes hit there was a lot of speculation if it was another McVeigh.
Yay for bad analogy time:
Mexican Firebombers would not equal all spanish speaking people. If you were afraid of people it might be Mexicans and even then it would be stupid.
If someone is scared of an overwieght guy on a park bench I feel for them words can describe.
Should a Middle-Eastern man feel that he should take precautions about his heritage on a US flight, possibly, but not from me. I will take a couple of lines from great literature and say I am the Lorax, I speak for trees. Remember kids butter battle wars are bad.
@not_seth_brundle:
Awesome.
@sncreducer:
Yes, sadly that IS the current situation for the most part. It sucks I agree. But you have to realize that the average american IS going to be effected by the government, sensationalist newsstories…. etc. etc. Is it unrealistic to expect arabs (or arab-looking people) to expect a bit of apprehension by other people when in the environment of an airline flight? And to adjust their behavior? Given the current post 9-11 climate? I think not.
And I somewhat agree with your example of the wary woman spraying me if I “technically” havnt done anything wrong. But it is not unreasonable for her to contact security on me if she feels threatened or uncomfortable about my presence. However if I get too close for her comfort…. I really cant blame her for pointing the mace at me (possibly even threatening me with it)… given the situation of me approaching her in a dark parking garage. Its the situation that warrants the action. Common sense would also tell me to contact the woman from far away & remain at a reasonable distance to ensure her comfort level & to keep her from POSSIBLY overreacting (spraying me in the face). Should I conform to her fears & change my actions to prevent such a situation? I think its reasonable.
@bedofnails: I didn’t declare suspicion and “prevention” absurd (whether or not I think they may be.) I took exception to your labeling of her irrational fear as “not unjustified.”
How many Iraqis have hijacked airliners in the US in the last 30 years?
McVeigh was a white Libertarian. Should I fear any white guy I see with a Ron Paul pin driving a U-Haul? Would that be “not unjustified?”
@GearheadGeek:
The ratio of “white guys” that have declared jhiad on America and it’s citizens to the ratio of all other “white guys” is more likely a little lower than the same ratios applied to men of middle eastern birth.
But you have a good point in that you can never hope to know who may be the next attacker, who has some beef, etc. I agree 100%.
All you can do is hedge your bets based on all of the information provided, past history, etc. It’s really no different than investing or real estate, in that your making a suspect assumption to what you feel to be the right reasons.
More often than not, people are wrong, money is lost, lives are lost. But it is when the right assumptions or guesses are made, when lives are saved, catastrophes are prevented, (money made), that we all seemingly forget about the “racial profiling”, or harassment.
@sncreducer:
Searching Corporation’s financial records, searching christians homes/persons, etc. etc. That is nowhere NEAR the same thing as deplaning people because one person (or others) feel uncomfortable about certain passengers. Now if they took every middleasterner off the plane, physically searched them, detained them … with out ANY cause… then that would be wrong. Fact is that there WAS cause (made by the flight personnel) to deplane. Flight personnel have wide lattitudes on what they can call justification for stopping a flight…. ANY kind of disturbance can have a plane land, deplane etc. etc.. The flight environment is a highly controlled one … as it should be. ANY question whether or not something is unsafe, a passenger is disruptive, creeping out other passengers etc. etc… the flight crew has the right to do something about it (like landing the plane or making someone deplane).
@phobs:
Its not racist to be “wary” of a group of people who fit a profile of known terrorists. If there was a terrorist group of red-headed white guys bombing train stations…. it would be prudent to scrutinize them IN that environment. THAT is racist? The fact that it is more likely that muslim terrorists would look like middleasterners is just reasonable. Especially when in a notorious environment like a subway, train station, airline flight etc. etc….where terroristic act are known/likely to happen.