What The???

Ever since 9/11, New Yorkers have been encouraged to report any "suspicious" behavior or people. What the hell constitutes "suspicious" behavior? Well, in many cases, I guess it means being brown.

Apparently some tourists who had probably never seen brown people before took it upon themselves to perform the heroic deed of alerting police to some "suspicious," "Middle-Eastern-looking" men wearing turbans who were on their double-decker tourist bus. Police came and handcuffed the men.They were Sikhs, of south Asian descent.

Mayor Bloomberg issued an apology today, but really. If we're going to tell people to report "suspicious behavior," shouldn't there be some kind of education as to what that would be? Or does anybody know what that means? They seem to be hoping that someone's "gut feeling" that something is wrong could prevent attacks.

Or maybe people should have some cultural education. So many Americans are so damned insular they know absolutely nothing about other cultures, as evidenced by the people who assumed that brown men wearing turbans must be Arabic terrorists. On the other hand, even if these men WERE from the Middle East, that in itself should not be considered suspicious.

Argh. I don't see any solution for this bullshit, but it is extremely frustrating.

On the other hand, I was amused by this advice to New Yorkers to stop being stupid, which should reduce suspicion of terrorism (if you're white, anyway).