without sounding racist or anythign like that. Why would you wear a turban in this country??

He's a Sikh, turbans have a big role in their religion. It may be foolhardy if it can be avoided, but depending on how hardcore you are I guess one doesn't have much of a choice.

Uh, for the same reason Americans wear wedding rings when hanging out with Amazon indians or Austrailian aborigines? For the same reason catholics wear crosses round thier neck when they visit the pyramids? If its part of your culture and identity, you tend to bring it with you no matter where you go. We are supposed to be the kind of country that understands and respects that concept, ya know?

If your kind is not welcome in a country, you don't go there. The question of what you would wear to such a country doesn't get asked. We are supposed to be the kind of country that accepts assimilates other cultures, that accepts the poor, tired, hungry, yadda.

You don't sound racist so much as simply uninformed. Go do some google searches on Sikhs.

well, you may not have wanted to sound racist, but you did (or maybe just ignorant...). sikhs wear turbans for the same reason that jews wear a kippah or yarmulke, the same reason that christians may choose to wear a cross, or a muslim chooses to wear a kufi...we've got freedom of religion in this country and their religion(s) dictate that they dress and act a certain manner.

First Amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

casey, thanks...didn't see your post though.

...talk about a fast response.

But what do you expect when you wear a turban in this country? I mean i understand that you should be able to say what you want and wear what you want. I mean even bill cosby cant talk about black people wihtout the naacp getting on his ass about what he said. AND HES BLACK.

Its the same as saying you have freedom of speech. Yes you have freedom of speech, but you dont have freedom from speech....what you say can get you in a shit load of trouble even if it is the "right thing"

Im jsut saying what do you expect when you wear a turban in this country?

Do you really expect not to get hasseld in some form.

And as for the secret service, they dont owe anyone an apolige. They are doing their jobs.

And yes you can say thats sad and bitch about how shit should be but its not that way. The country is full of racism and I doubt that that will change soon.

Ya I think you pyrex and I all made comments basically all at the same time. So funny.

If ya'll are checking EA so much, why aren't you posting more?

the thing is, you can't change racism by giving in to it or avoiding symbols that are used by law enforcement to identify the people they want to fuck with... change comes by making a stand, as this guy and many many others have done (i posted an article very similar to this one a while back that no one seems to have picked up on...)

wow, you made a few comments that really got my juices flowing. i'll address them after i point out what they are.

"what do you expect when you wear a turban in this country?"

"And as for the secret service, they dont owe anyone an apology (sp). They are doing their jobs."

"The country is full of racism and I doubt that that will change soon."

first point: uh, how about a little bit of tolerance? that's what i'd expect. sorry, but that's a bullshit argument. as casey pointed out, NONE of the hijackers that were involved on 9/11 wore a turban. what the cops are doing is profiling, the same type of shit that made headlines in NJ (and I'm sure in other states) a few years ago. If this guy was just taking pictures around campus, then he wasn't doing a thing that was wrong and it's the cops and secret service who are in the wrong.

second point: true, the secret service was doing their jobs, but they DO owe him an apology. their comments about him "pulling out an uzi from underneath his turban" were completely off base, I don't care what context they were in. detaining this guy for 7 hours because he was taking pictures on the campus of a school that he attends because of his appearance is absolutely wrong. i'm positive that if a white guy was doing the same thing, no eyebrows would have been raised.

third point: yeah, you're right about the fact that this country is full of racism and i agree, i doubt it will change soon. in fact, the world is full of racism. how is that changed? by teaching tolerance and acceptance of people that aren't exactly like you. unfortunately, teaching or talking about it isn't the way to get it done. we have to raise our kids this way, and the only way that they'll learn this is by observing our actions.

casey: i post and comment on things that interest me. unfortunately, it takes me a while to formulate a longer post, i like to sit and think things out a bit before i write them out and unfortunately, i don't have the time to do that at work.

Bah, I just shoot from the hip, that's why most of my posts are so typo-riddled.

Iceman: Lets just for a moment forget about the obvious racial profiling. do you really think a member of al quaeda who is taking surveillance photos is going to wear his turban and robes and try to look as sunni muslim as possible?

No, obviously not. He's going to try and look just like the rest of us. Remember this line from the article, "For one thing, they said, only Sahni, whose family is originally from India, was searched and questioned while Shawaf, a Muslim from Saudi Arabia who dresses and wears his hair in Western style [just like the 9/11 hijackers!], was not"

If one feels the secret service had a good reason to detain the turban-wearing Sikh, then they should have had ten times more reason to detain his Saudi friend. But why didn't they? Obviously because he didn't "look" threatening to the secret service even though his character profile was a vastly better fit to that of a terrorist.

What I'm trying to say here is that the kind of profiiling they are doing isn't just ethically bad police work, its dangerously stupid and incompetent police work. It actually makes the country less, not more safe. No turban-wearing Sikh has ever been a threat to this country. The more the cops allow themselves to be distracted by Sikhs (or brown people, or musicians), the more the really threatening people will just slip by unnoticed.

I'm glad you linked to the writeup by Ian Spiers, Casey. That's one of the most recent and radical experiences I've read about lately. I could go on some kind of tangent here, but this whole SS-related stuff is too an American issue that I feel my thoughts on the issue would perhaps be moot.

One last thing. From your comments iceman, I think most of us are assuming that you think Sikhs shouldn't wear turbans while they are in the US. Its occurred to me that this assumption may be false. So let me ask you the direct question and then we'll let the thread evolve from there. Do you think people should not wear turbans in this country if it will put their life liberty or happiness at risk?

I never said that you shouldnt wear a turban. I mean you can do whatever tickels your fancy. I dont care.

My point is, what do you expect when you wear a turban in this country due to the recent terrorists attacks and threats (when i say recent i mean from 9/11 to present).

I am personally not a religious person and see no reason for any religiuos things. But im not one to discriminate against others. I mean i honestly dont give a fuck what you do, I only care then it starts effecting me.

The dude can wear a turban. I dont care. But you have to expect this thign to happen especially in this country. Liberties have been pulled in the past to make the whole nation feel safer. During WWII the US stuck the japanese in interment camps. So I mean this issue doesnt suprise me at all.

Does it make me feel safe?

Absolutely not. I dont think the goverment has done one thing to make any of us safer since 9/11. Yes most of you probably think airport security has gone up. But if it has why do people get on the planes with razorblades and things jsut to prove that they can?? I mean i honestly think that the "increased security" at airports is just a front to make citizens feel better and safer, when its done nothign.

And I wouldnt start with Homeland security. Id like to see us win that "war on drugs" first. War on drugs was in quotes because its a bullshit war that we have never won. It just makes citizens feel better about things.

Back to my origonal post (ill elaborate this time on my question). The dude seemed smart. So knowing how this county is with sterotypes, why would you wear a turban? I mean your asking to get odd looks and maybe even arrested. Which infact occurred.

I feel that sometimes you have to sacrafice somethign you do and like to insure the saftey of yourself. You can dissagree. I dont care. I just feel that your making more trouble for yourself if you wear a turban these days. Religion or not. I mean it was the americans who stuck japanese citizens in interment camps during WWII.

If you think that people should know what it means to wer a turban, then you feel that way. But there are very few people who knows what a turban is for. Their are also many other religious things that almost no one knows about. And I respect that.

And yes americans are ignorant. I doubt that will ever change.....thats why I dont bitch about it.

I also dont see this incodent as being a big deal. There are much larger things to worry about then one dude wearing a turban and getting taken by the secret service. I mean he is still alive.

As for my post though, i was wondering why you would wear a turban in this country if you know what people think about them.

Id like to end this with saying ...... I dont care.

I agree. If you wear a turban in this country and are aware that it is a country full of ingorant people (like all countries) then you should expect to take soem heat for it. Most Sikhs do get heat for it. But you also feel that he should be able to wear it his turban even though you almost sound like you think he's stupid for doing so.

I agree with you that the airport security and the war on drugs and everything else is more of a show than anything real. But you sound almost nihilistic about it.

So let me ask you another question iceman. Who is more wrong? The people who beat Sikhs up for wearing a turban or the turban-wearing Sikhs themselves? That is, of the two, which are the ones that need to change? I'm guessing that you feel the answer is neither, that you are fine with the situation as it currently is, despite (or because of) the phoniness of everything behind it.

Here's the part where I play armchair shrink for a second. Nobody likes it when I do this. Try and bear my presumptuousness.

Its tough to be smart enough to see through the bulllshit. I think some of this stuff really does piss you off on some level but at the same time you simply don't feel like anything you could do is enough to do anything about it, so instead you choose frustration and depression, which as as a life philosophy manifests as existentialism or nihilism. I disagree with the premise that you can't have an impact. I know it sounds cliche but ignore that for a moment. Consider developing some values (of any kind) and then live by them ferociously. Its what gives meaning to a nihilistic life and frankly, you won't feel so damn depressed. I'm an athiest so don't think I'm trying to get religious on your ass. I'm just telling you that you ought to start caring about something. I won't tell you that anything in particular is really worth caring about, but I will say that giving a shit about something will just make you feel better.

Me, I choose freedom as my numero uno guiding value. Any infringement on the principals derived from the concept of freedom drive me absolutely wild, only because I choose for them to. I don't have to give a shit about freedom. I could instead curl up and go to sleep and eventually die bored as you seem to be considering. So instead I root for Freedom, and a few other things like Truth, Beauty, Art, Science, Reason, Balance, Nature, and some more specific things too like Apple computers, the New England Patriots, fags, guns, genetic engineering, domestic energy and fuel production, and the elimination of the national debt. I don't care about any of these things because I honestly feel that I'm omnipotent enough be able to consider every facet of each subject and its diametric opposites, but because I've learned that caring deeply about something feels good. It doesn't matter if the changing condition of that thing is completely meaningless, like a football team. One could make the argument (as you seem to be) that Freedom is similarly meaningless. Also like a football team, without people rooting for it, it is meaningless. You give it meaning because it makes you feel good to do so, you ultimately don't need any more reason for it than that.

Go read "Zen and the Art of Motocycle Maintainence" by Robert Pirsig. Its a good read for where you seem to be at right now.

Boy I wish I could go back and edit that for readability.

As for caring about things, yes i care about alot.

I care about me, my family, my future. I have values too.

Do i think i can change things. to an extent yes but bitching at each other online isnt changing a damn thing.

I think the larger questions is do i want thigns changed. And to this question id have to say im fine with how things are. Yes some people are oppressed in many ways but i dont feel that that will ever change. Somone will always be oppressed.

Am i depressed. Not really. I am infact pissed off that the world is full of stupid people. But I know i cant change that. For we are all ignorant in some matter.

I in no way blame anyone for following their religion or ways. I just wonder what the people are thinking when they do it because i can see bad things happening. Just as the case in this story. I also know that you cant live in fear and sometimes you must speak out.

I guess im pissed off at people at a whole on this one. everyone has sympathy for somone who is being oppressed. I mean its not a bad thing but it jsut pisses me off because people can have sympathy but no one is changing anythign.

Am i going to change anything?? No, because i dont want to or care enough. There is alot more in my life that i want to do and care about more than somone being oppressed.

I guss im the kind of person that looks out for myself and cares about my future. Its not that i dont care about anyone else i just dont see stuff like this as a problem that concerns me.

Yea i bitched about it on here...only because i got negative response from my first post.

As for me and politics, i dont really like the politics in this country becaus i see no real change happening. We are still dealign wit the same problems from 100 years ago. I think our goverment is way to slow to adapt to new problems. Thats why none of this concerns me. If i think i could make drastic changes to the government then i would participate. But i know that would not happen since drastic changes in our type of government is very uncommon and never happened.

And i wouldnt worry about the readibility of our posts, as long as we understand each other thats all that matters.

dammit talk about spelling errors..my bad

Ha! See now I really only disagree with you one one thing. I think that just saying what you did in that comment does make a difference. A bigger one than you think and I think it does help make changes happen. Someone will google something and surf to this site and this post and read the comments. They might be thinking the same damn thing and they'll see your comment and say to themselves, "I can relate to this guy". Suddenly they will feel more confident about thier own ideas and maybe talk about them with a few more people where they wouldn't have before. Have that process repeat itself three, eight, fifty more times and suddenly its not just an idea, its a movement, and it changes the world. Every thought is a seed so don't be so cynical.

Well we just think differently then.