American Sikh actor Waris Ahluwalia barred from US-bound flight because he refused to remove his turban

“[Taking the turban off] is not something that I would do in public,”
Ahluwalia told the New York Daily News. “That’s akin to asking someone
to take off their clothes.”

That’s not a reason to allow him to wear a turban. I could claim that carrying a bomb is a sign of my religious faith. The reason that he should have been allowed to wear a turban is because there’s no good reason to not allow it. Doesn’t matter what it means to him. Just a nitpick. :wink:

You’ve equated carrying a bomb with a known and reasonable religious artifact. Is it because the man has brown skin, or because he’s not Christian…which is the basis for your bigotry? Or do you also believe crucifixes should be banned from carrying onto airplanes as well, with their sharp edges and blade-like construction?

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Definitely. You have to watch out for them Christian terrorists. You never know when you might have a member of Y’all Queda boarding… :open_mouth:

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My point is that it shouldn’t matter if the artifact is religious or not. The only criteria should be safety. So it doesn’t matter if the turban is religious or not. You’ll have to do a better job of explaining why you think I’m bigoted. I just don’t think religion matters at all in this situation.

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somebody pushed their luck dragon.

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It’s on that list of things of stuff. Race, sex, religion, creed, national origin and what have you, depends on which list you reference. It’s why a security force might think it can force a woman to take off her bra in front of everyone, but that we would all agree that her complaint over it, and insistence it not happen, is reasonable.

If you really think safety is the last only word, you may be in danger of relinquishing things of value to yourself that you have overlooked.

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Could you please tell me which religion with more than 1,000,000 followers requires you to carry a bomb?

The simple fact that you are so focused on this man’s turban shows that you don’t know anything about Sikhism.

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Next thing you know, you’re going to have to watch out for them Jain terrorists… :open_mouth:

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they are very flexible containers : )



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Perhaps it is the obstinate belief in the superiority of your opinion, and the intolerance or other opinion based on your pre judgements?

You may or may not be racist… but yeah, bigoted is a totally fair word to use in describing your apparent position/ the one you are defending and forwarding.

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Not to mention cyber-terroism

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your apparent position/ the one you are defending and forwarding. bigoted is a totally fair word to use in describing your apparent position/ the one you are defending and forwarding.

That’s because you’ve misconstrued my apparent position. Which is as follows: the obvious pretense that Aero Mexico staff were using to bar Ahluwalia from boading was security. (The pretense, mind you. The actual motivation could be and probably is different from the pretense). To wit - a piece of fabric is somehow a threat. It’s an absurd pretense. You don’t even need to get to the religious freedom part. You can simply point to the airline’s pretense as absurd. So why even bother getting into religious freedom part, which is much more loaded and complicated? It’s just an exercise in logic. I’m not arguing that we should discriminate against Sikhs. I’m arguing that we should be examining the pretense that a piece of fabric - whether it’s a turban, a yamaka or a bishop’s robe - is in any way a threat. If you destroy the pretense then you expose the actual motivation. Which is ignorance, intolerance and fear.

keep inflexibly repeating your one-side of the sectarian prejudgements that are the right ones to have. I get it.

it is not bigoted behavior when it is you, gotcha.

perhaps you could be not inflexible in your response, thus disproving my thesis.

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Yes, I think we all know that security theater is absurd. It’s absurd for us to remove our shoes; my loafers are not a threat. It’s absurd for us to remove our hats, and it’s absurd for us to have our jackets X-rayed.

But as you say, you’re just presenting a meaningless logic puzzle. I don’t know of any religion that deems shoes holy, or insists that you hold a crucifix aloft. But there’s a real religion called Sikhism that Waris belongs to which has uncut hair covered with a turban as part of their practice. Rather than dance around it with a logic puzzle, can we just agree that Sikhs should be treated with dignity when they ask for it, and not be forced to do something deeply shameful for them in public?

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I tried to find out if there was any information on how TSA handles nuns’ habits, but my internet access is so bad that it’s not going to happen. But, the fact that any keywords I used to try to find out the answer never brought up nuns and ALWAYS brought up Sikhs says something in and of itself.

Here is the ACLU’s info on the subject. You’ll notice that there are multiple steps which were not followed by the equivalent Mexican agency:

Q: What if I wear a religious head covering and I am selected by airport security officials for additional screening?

A: You have the right to wear religious head coverings. You should assert your right to wear your religious head covering if asked to remove it. The current policy (which is subject to change) relating to airport screeners and requiring removal of religious head coverings, such as a turban or hijab, is that if an alarm goes off when you walk through the metal detector the TSA officer may then use a hand-wand to determine if the alarm is coming from your religious head covering. If the alarm is coming from your religious head covering the TSA officer may want to pat-down or have you remove your religious head covering. You have the right to request that this pat-down or removal occur in a private area. If no alarm goes off when you go through the metal detector the TSA officer may nonetheless determine that additional screening is required for non-metallic items. Additional screening cannot be required on a discriminatory basis (because of race, gender, religion, national origin or ancestry). The TSA officer will ask you if he or she can pat-down your religious head covering. If you do not want the TSA officer to touch your religious head covering you must refuse and say that you would prefer to pat-down your own religious head covering. You will then be taken aside and a TSA officer will supervise you as you pat-down your religious head covering. After the pat-down the TSA officer will rub your hands with a small cotton cloth and place it in a machine to test for chemical residue. If you pass this chemical residue test, you should be allowed to proceed to your flight. If the TSA officer insists on the removal of your religious head covering you have a right to ask that it be done in a private area.

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I never said it was meaningless. Exercise is rarely meaningless. For body or mind. I think the security theater IS the problem. The acting out of fear IS the problem. As long as we focus on the SYMPTOM we won’t fix the problem.

I never said he should be forced to remove his turban nor did I say he shouldn’t be treated with dignity. You must be thinking of a different thread.

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I’ve never had to remove a hat for an airport screening (or any other). Even when they’ve wanded me, they tend to ignore my head.

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