Ideological Profile of a Neo-Con

http://communities.canada.com/calgaryherald/blogs/corbellareport/archive/2010/01/08/the-games-security-plays-are-mostly-just-for-show.aspx

Wow…and to think that I still want to be a journalist myself. I guess it is a little comforting to know that at the worst, my career could end with me doing poorly written, negligently researched, blatantly biased op ed pieces for some cheap right wing rag. You, Licia, seem to have that part of the job description well in hand.

I’m sorry; perhaps I’m overstepping my boundaries as a 20-something student. After all, aren’t we ‘Youths’ supposed to be (according to your tightly indoctrinated world view) rebellious kids with no grip on reality, bent on saving the world at the cost of all else? I mean, that’s what stereotypes are for, right, filing people into neat little categories like ‘naive student’, ‘jaded reporter’ or ‘Muslim terrorist’?

I thought your article The Games Security Plays Are Mostly Just For Show was a perfect example of right-wing propaganda. Maybe that’s what you were going for. After all, you’ve titled your columns The Corbella Report, a name which conjures clichéd images of soaring eagles, jumpsuit-clad Mexicans and Bill O’Riely’s self-righteous countenance. I’m sure Steven and the rest of Comedy Central appreciates your efforts.

But all hilarity aside, I feel I should point out some of the glaring hypocrisies and other weak links in your arguments. I did like how you attempted to disarm us on the ‘loonie left’ by so cleverly pointing out “We all know that every person born in a particular country is not a terrorist”. That was a real gem. ‘See! I am understanding of the complexities of clashing cultures, I am tolerant of other ethnicities…that cute little sentence proves it!’ The fact that you then go on to imply quite the opposite is something we’re just supposed to ignore? I am also a big fan of the first three paragraphs of your piece. You seem to be doing two things at once: demonstrating your outstanding cleverness, and proving that a technique which is so easily and successfully used by you, a familiar ‘one of us travelers’ must be sufficient for use as an airport security measure. Surely, if an untrained layperson like yourself can use ethnic profiling, it must be fool-proof! Even police departments do it! Tell me, how many murder cases have the Calgary Police been able to close, simply by stopping every African-Canadian man with wearing a bandana on the highway?

This leads me to my main critique of your arguments. You claim to be supporting profiling, but argue that ethnic profiling is in reality a shabby attempt at ‘ideological profiling’. Ha! ‘Careful what you believe, the Thought Police will get you!’ If that weren’t enough, the examples you chose actually prove your ideas folly, if only you’d taken the time to examine them closely. Instead, as any good neo-con would, you plow blindly onward in the face of overwhelming common sense. Ethnic profiling could not and did not pick out Richard Reid. How could it, he’s British! But Britain’s not on the list of Official Enemies…the sneaky buggers used his white skin as a disguise. Tell me, short of reading Reid’s thoughts, how would you have gone about picking him out of a lineup of travel weary passengers? Wait, let me guess…the Terrorist Watch List! If the might of Western Intelligence didn’t flag him, you somehow assume that a minimum-wage security guard will be able to? Ok, one miss…how about Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab? Tell me, do you honestly believe that you’d be able to pick him out of a lineup of five or six good, clean, God-fearing African-Americans? Oh, right, his name must give it away. He’s got a funny name, so we should single him out, along with the hundreds of thousands of other people with funny names. Oops, that means that our heroic Barack should be subject to cavity searches too doesn’t it?

Apparently thanks to these dastardly deceivers from foreign countries, we’re now forced to endure a gross invasion of privacy…the ‘electronic strip search’! Good heavens, we can’t allow proper, upright Caucasian citizens like you and me to be subject to the same treatment as those Muslim creatures with funny sounding names! Did it occur to you that perhaps this pales in comparison to regressive, backward strategies you yourself are supporting?

And finally, as added proof that sacrificing our liberty is a small price to pay to feel safe, you toss in that little tidbit about patiently allowing an Israeli security woman to pat you down, before adding one last incongruous comment about western government’s stupidity, since you rightly assume that most of your readers hate the government.

You were correct on one score however. Airport security is mostly just a show put on to make the traveling public feel better and keep flying. Electronic strip searches, profiling, magic ‘you’re a terrorist’ wands…none of these things will make flying safer. The only way to do that is to stop giving the terrorists reason to blow up planes in the first place.

The man (or in this case right wing shill disguised as a journalist) who’d trade his liberty for a safe and dreamless sleep doesn’t deserve the both of them and neither shall (s)he keep.

Yours in youthful protest,
21st Century Digital Boy
Canmore, Alberta