Yesterday a Texas teenager, who happens to be a Muslim, brought a homemade clock to school and was arrested because the clock was mistaken for a bomb. Some people are blaming racism but zero tolerance policies are the real problem.
NBC News reports that he won’t be charged:
No Charges For Ahmed Mohamed, Teen Arrested After Bringing Homemade Clock to SchoolPolice in Texas said Wednesday that charges will not be filed against a 14-year-old Muslim high school student who was arrested after he brought in a homemade clock that a teacher said looked like a bomb.The arrest drew an outcry on social media. Hundreds of thousands of people used the hashtag #IStandWithAhmed — and President Barack Obama invited the teen to the White House.Ahmed Mohamed, who is Sudanese-American, was arrested on Monday in the Dallas suburb of Irving after he took the clock to his high school.He told The Dallas Morning News that he had been in robotics club in middle school, and he wanted to show his new teacher what he could do.
This Associated Press video report provides more background:
Because the teenager in the story is a Muslim, the left has rushed to blame the story on racism, rather than the zero tolerance policies rampant in America’s public schools.
Robby Soave of Reason makes that point very well:
Hey Liberals, #IStandwithAhmed Isn’t Only About Racism. It’s About School Zero Tolerance Insanity.As evidenced by Twitter—#IStandWithAhmed—everybody is on Ahmed’s side (with the possible exception of his school’s officials, who sent a letter home to parents alerting them to the non-incident). Even President Obama tweeted, “Cool clock, Ahmed. Want to bring it to the White House? We should inspire more kids like you to like science. It’s what makes America great.” His message was retweeted 200,000 times in the past three hours.I stand with Ahmed, too. But I also stand with Alex Stone.Who is Alex Stone? He’s the South Carolina 16-year-old who was arrested and suspended last year for writing a purely fictional story about a dinosaur in which he killed the prehistoric beast with a gun. Stone was a white kid.
Legal Insurrection has covered zero tolerance insanity many times:
Enough said?
UPDATE: Thanks to Rush Limbaugh for the nice shout out:
Pop Tart guns. Key chain charms. We have seen this story. No charges for this kid. The kid’s name is Ahmed Mohamed, by the way. Charges will not be filed against him. He’s a 14-year-old Muslim high school student arrested after he brought in a homemade clock that a teacher said looked like a bomb. Legal Insurrection — which is a very, very great and eminently qualified legal website. Legal Insurrection has spent countless posts covering zero-tolerance insanity on school campuses all over the country.Kindergarteners have been sent home for using their hands to pretend to be firing a gun. A 13-year-old with a toy AK-47 has been shot and killed by the cops, and a 10-year-old boy was suspended for pointing a finger like a gun. A 12-year-old Rhode Island student was suspended for small key chain gun. “Oklahoma teachers union seeks to keep zero tolerance rules banning imaginary guns.” Everybody has become so sensitized to this because of the actual shootings at schools that there has become a “zero tolerance.”So the point here is that the effort is being made to blame school officials and the cops for Islamophobia here, and that is not what is going on. Zero-tolerance policies at schools, which are the direct result of previous incidents — the zero tolerance is out of control, such as pretending to shoot a gun with your finger (that gets you sent home) — is what’s responsible here. It’s just the latest example, and it’s made to order for Obama, because here we have once again backlash against Muslims, you see?That’s what this really is. So Obama will be able to make a speech about how dangerous this is, how unfortunate it is, how sorry it is. Innocent little 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed has a brilliant science project, a brilliant clock, a new way of doing a clock. (Yeah, one looks just like a bomb in a briefcase.) Obama gets to bring him to the White House, make a star out of him, make Obama’s star shine even brighter. And once again, the bottom line: Characterize the United States as a racist and bigoted country.
Featured image via YouTube.
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