Posted on 08/30/2007 8:28:09 AM PDT by Froufrou
A woman who complained that some fellow passengers spoke Arabic and "had odd behavior" prevented a Chicago-bound American Airlines flight from departing San Diego, police said Wednesday.
Flight 590, scheduled to depart at 11 p.m. Tuesday, left its gate about 11:15 but returned to the boarding area after the woman, who was traveling with at least one child, indicated she wanted to get off the airplane. The flight then was unable to make Lindbergh Field's 11:30 p.m. curfew for departures, said Irene McCormack, a spokeswoman for the San Diego Harbor Police.
The flight, carrying 126 passengers, was rescheduled for midmorning Wednesday and arrived in Chicago in the afternoon, an American Airlines spokesman said.
McCormack said it is unusual for planes to return to the gate. She said it's usually for medical and mechanical problems or a disturbance.
The woman first complained to the flight crew that four to seven men were possibly speaking Arabic in the boarding area. The woman added that they "had odd behavior." The crew decided to return to the boarding area because the woman indicated she wanted off the plane.
The American Airlines spokesman indicated the plane returned to its gates because of a dispute between passengers. The spokesman didn't provide details on the dispute.
A Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman said it returned because of "suspicious activity on board the plane."
Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago, was upset about the airline's actions. He said television reporters told him that six Iraqi Americans were detained after a passenger became uncomfortable with the men speaking Arabic.
"It is one thing to flag suspicious behavior, but to flag a global language? We are deplaning people for who they are, not what they do," Rehab said.
The Associated Press reported Defense Training Systems had hired the men to train U.S. Marines at Camp Pendleton in California.
McCormack said no one was detained in the incident.
That’s nothing. I actually spoke Arabic with a former Air Force attache while on a plane once.
I’m working on a degree in International Business and one of my projects is developing online training for Arabic-English speakers.
It'd called "gum jihad" and you need to notify Homeland Security immediately! we need to be vigilant, ya' know!
I agree.
Why is it always Americans who have to do the accommodating ? If you were going somewhere where you knew that other people might be afraid of you, and you actually cared about them, you'd try to do what you could to alleviate their fears, wouldn't you ? Isn't that what we do in Iraq ? We teach our soldiers Arabic so that we won't terrorize them by just running into their villages and killing them. Pity that they can't return the courtesy when in our country.
Nice try dude.
I agree. Maybe I'm naive but because I fly often, I look at it statistically and the statistics show I have about a million times greater odds getting killed in a car accident on my way to the airport than I do perishing in a hijacked airplane.
The issue is what was the suspicious behavior...
Language alone is not enough unless you hear something that you understand and it indicates suspicious conduct or intent.
Yeah, and if I missed my connecting flight because this woman felt "uncomfortable" I certainly wouldn't be too happy.
Let's just start grounding all of our flights when a passenger becomes suspicious of other travelers --especially when other travelers speak a different language!
I love these threads! They bring out all the knuckle-draggers! Some people really need to step away from FR for a couple of hours a week and go out and see the real world! LOL!
Do I become a different person if I speak Spanish?
Good point.. related to what I was saying in an earlier post... MrJ <- English, Spanish, Japanese.... hmm... do I look Japanese...
Of course, this can prove 2 points:
One is that are not (”It is one thing to flag suspicious behavior, but to flag a global language? We are deplaning people for who they are, not what they do,” Rehab said.) should not be judged by the language(s) we speak.
The other is that Anyone of any color, race, creed, etc... can be anyone (who might be dangerous).
MJ
Right out of the "progressive" handbook. I did not say "evil", you did. I never have a need to put words in other people's mouth as argument. Try it sometime.
And yes, I maintain that that is totally irrelevant to the story, "who" hired them.
To emphasize, business today is amoral and focused on profit. Neither good nor evil, neither fearful or reckless, just focused.
It is true that appearance and language are not absolutely accurate in determining who a person is, but in the case of terrorists, the pattern has been extremely consistent. Overwhelmingly, terrorists are Middle-Eastern males between the ages of 18 and 25, and they speak Arabic. This fact significantly narrows the number of people who are likely to be terrorists. It's not perfect, but it works well.
I can get a room, order food, and find my way about in Europe and Japan, but neither myself, nor my associates are fluent enough to hold our private conversations in their languages, nor do we feel the necessity. Please travel to any of the military bases in asia, and see for yourself, just how many contractors or military personnel can speak or hold their conversations in Japanese. If you travel that much, then you must know that very few people speak anything but their native language, when conversing amongst themselves.
Actually, what your religion is is a LOT more relevant.
Lots of non-muslims can write arabic.
I’m fairly sure, that if you were to travel with Americans that go to different countries to train individuals in the native tongue, that you would find them speaking english amongst themselves. That is what people normally do.
It is true that appearance and language are not absolutely accurate in determining who a person is, but in the case of terrorists, the pattern has been extremely consistent. Overwhelmingly, terrorists are Middle-Eastern males between the ages of 18 and 25, and they speak Arabic. This fact significantly narrows the number of people who are likely to be terrorists. It’s not perfect, but it works well.
Darn... sorry about that... typing from a laptop, with a mouse and oversensitive touchpad in the middle).. and it`s 3 am... made many typos/mistakes.. so much I missed my total point. But, I totally agree with you.
1 more time... MrJ <- is paleskin.... SPEAKS English, Spanish, and Japanese... (not mix >.<)
I think peeps get the rest of the post though... and I argree with what you said... if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck..............
MJ
Thank you for that welcome inference. I suspected such.
Why are Iraqi’s training our marines? Love to hear that explanation.
I left my knee-jerk manual in my other suit.
Reasonably, the way it was worded, it was intended that the average ignorant American (or the terrorist sympathizers) would assume that meant hired directly by the US government, genius.
Why are Iraqis training our marines? Love to hear that explanation.
To give the military personnel the best training possible. To put them in the closest environment to the real battlefield, including language and tactics. To put them in an environment where not everyone speaks English, so it might confuse them if they weren`t prepared for it... that`s part of being a good, trained soldier. The more you know about your enemy, the better your chances are.
MJ
BIASED JOURNALISM HEADLINE 101:
1.) Ignore the "had odd behavior" aspect of the story and stress "Arabic spoken" in your headline. Play the Xenophobia Card with the first two words.
2.) Use the word "gripe" in the subheadline to convince your readers that the passanger's concerns had no possible merit. Ensure that your readers get an immediate impression about who was right and who was wrong in your opinion.
3.) Remember that "What-Where-When-How" is obsolete journalism. Journalism now is all about pushing a political agenda.
4.) Push. Push. Push.
5.) If you heed Steps 1 through 4, you can succeed in creating a climate where other passengers will be intimidated into not reporting suspicious behavior in the future, no matter what language is spoken.
I’ve had two people tell me that they were being insulted by people speaking another language because those people assumed that the Americans could not understand their native tongue. One was a tall blonde haired blue eyed football player build who is fluent in Spanish. The other was a group of American college students who was eating in an ethnic restaurant in NYC. One of the kids grew up in that country as a missionary kid and was completely fluent in that language.
Both times they confronted the speakers fluently in their native language and it was met with tremendous shock. They thought the stupid Americans couldn’t understand them.
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