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Opinions: Offer a prayer for the end of discrimination in the United States


In case you were wondering, the United States is still one nation under God, or at least a Judeo-Christian God, as evidenced by last week's incident aboard a US Airways flight, in which several Muslim imams were escorted off the plane due to "suspicious" behavior.

Last Monday, six Muslim clerics were removed from a flight in Minneapolis, bound for Phoenix. The group attended a national conference and was returning home.

The group was removed after a passenger passed a note along to a flight attendant, suggesting that the men looked suspicious. Apparently, some of the so-called "suspicious behavior" included prayer.

Half of them prayed before the flight in the terminal, as is common in Islam (devout Muslims pray five times a day).

Passenger accounts vary, but some noted the group spoke in both Arabic and English, and reported some of the clerics spoke critically of the war in Iraq.

Apparently, we can now add Iraq to the list of topics not to be discussed on a plane, along with the taboo words of "bomb" and "hijack." And prayer also constitutes imminent danger.

The peculiar behavior went from there - a few of the gentlemen requested seatbelt extensions, but, a flight attendant felt the extensions weren't necessary, even though at least one of the clerics was overweight.

I suppose one needs to be "morbidly obese," according to new reports, in order to request seatbelt extensions.

Perhaps the most suspicious action was not sitting in their assigned seats.

Occasionally, I might switch my seat to sit next to the window, the aisle or a friend, but I am aware this is strange and socially unacceptable; the imams should have been aware of this fact as well.

Lastly, three of the imams had one-way tickets and no baggage.

Now, the plane was headed for Phoenix, and a few of the clerics were from the Phoenix-Tempe area, so there isn't a slight possibility that those few were simply returning home.

After the group was detained, they remained in Minneapolis with a fellow imam. They returned to the airport the next day to learn they had been refunded their fare, but the airline refused to put them on another flight or assist them in finding alternative carriers.

Quite possibly, the clerics were suspicious, and the flight crew and airline employees were doing their job in removing an imminent threat. More likely, the imams were victims of "flying while Muslim."

The hypersensitivity of passengers and crew resulted in the unfair treatment of Muslims, based on their religion.

Islam is very much a part of mainstream, public knowledge, and recognizing prayer and those with different cultural practices should be common sense.

Prayer is not a suspicious action worthy of detainment. Certainly the imams should have been permitted to fly once being cleared by the FBI, but this did not happen.

So, the question arises as to whether the airline acted in the interests of security or blatantly discriminated.

While it is a good thing to promote safety on flights, it is never acceptable to discriminate and abridge the constitutional liberties of religion and speech of those who are different.

The incident involving the imams was a blasphemy against liberty, not a mere promotion of security.

There needs to be cultural understanding and an end to discrimination. There must be a reaffirmation of this in our one nation under God, which is indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Rick Beitman is a political science and French senior, who is of the opinion that UA is on its way to becoming ASU South, because the Wildcats got owned on Saturday! Contact him at: Richard.Beitman@asu.edu.


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