Hang on, the teacher thought it was a threat?
Ooof. I havenāt watched Interstellar yetā¦ I think this 1 minute 12 second vingette has convinced me to actually pay money to view it conditionally with copyright bullshit.
Manā¦ Thatās fucking bleak.
I really hope this entire incident keeps this kid humble. He suddenly has new found celebrity in all this. Which can ruin a kidās expectations.
I havenāt seen it yet either. Iāve been waiting to see if my wife gets it for me on BR for my birthday coming up. I see itās now on netflix. I really want to see it. Iāve been told its great by some friends and it was partly filmed in my very own sleepy little prairie town (closed off parts of the old-main-road during filming) so looking forward to seeing familiar sites.
But ya that clip is bleak. I fear having similarly toned conversations when my son gets to school age.
I, for one, want to start a movement to de-criminalize clock making in America.
In all seriousness. Teachers are one of the lowest-paid vs. education-level jobs out there. Teachers need to start using their intelligence (brains!) and look at intent, not freaking out over every little thing.
āLegalize Clockā would be a seriously awesome teeshirt that I would buy and wear (If I was in the habit of buying and wearing teeshirts with awesome stuff written on themā¦)
He reveals that heās switching high-schools
Soooo, presumably at least the second time his family has had to move to seek a better lifeā¦good job Irving, Texas
Iām as tolerant as the next white, third-generation irish-American, enitled, old boomer guyā¦but I draw the line at smarty-pants immigrant-family kids designing and engineering strange, exotic devices that frighten me.
Have this young man sit himself down with a canister of Lincoln Logs to keep him occupied and get this crazy āmakerā fad out of his system. Today itās something called a āclockāā¦tomorrow it could be something far more abominable to right-thinking folks.
Harumph!
Hey, a question: why doesnāt this post show up in the list at http://boingboing.net/category/post , which I find easier to navigate than the default new design? Itās linked from your 3:08 a.m. post Cory, when you expand it, but it doesnāt appear in the main list. It would be great to be able to trust that scrolling down the main list at http://boingboing.net/category/post would let me not miss any posts when Iām catching up. Thanks!
Saw this on social media yesterday:
AGREE! New version is not completely user friendly, IMHO.
One thing in this whole story that is very disheartening to me is how clueless the teachers who first saw the clock were and how little support they (apparently) gave Ahmed. I expect teachers to know the personalities and capabilities of their students; to be able to discern real threats from imaginary; to be able to stand up and say, āWait a minute. I know Ahmed. This is clock, FFS!ā. You know, to be mentors, not security guards. I think the situation could have been avoided completely if, from the very beginning, the teachers reacted appropriately. When our teachers canāt do that, they should get training or be fired.
The police officers of Irving, Texas should not be getting their training on identification of IEDs from action movies.
Also, it sounded from his description like the teacher that he showed it to was the one that turned him inā¦ Whereas the original story I had read was that the teacher he showed it to just told him to put it away, and it was his English teacher that turned him in.
He seems to have a pretty level-headed family. Behind many a great young man is a great mom. Anyway, President Ahmed Mohamed in 2036?
Go over the Chief of Policeās house:
Movies on the wall: SWAT Training Day The Hurt Locker
I believe that we should stop hiring former military personnel for law enforcement jobs. The mindset is completely different.
All police officers should be required to have a A.A. or A.S. as a minimum, those with a Criminal Justice degree need not apply. Encourage those with a Customer Service background, provide on-going Ethics and Philosophy classes.
Depends on their role in the military. I would tend to want to rule out people who might have PTSD - which may turn out to be caused by physical brain damage rather than a treatable mental illness - but I know at least one ex-military policeman who is very unhappy about armed police who have not been in the military - as he says, most of them do not understand what guns do to people, whereas as a former military policeman he is all too aware of it. However, this is the British Army and I had probably better not go into detail here on the views of British soldiers on the US Army, except to quote an ex-REME officer who said āWell, put it like this, theyāre better than the Israelis.ā
I like to imagine how his classmates have viewed the events of the past week. I wonder what conversations have taken place, both among themselves in the playground, away from the teachers, and in the classroom.
Ahmed made something and brought it to school.
Ahmed got frogmarched out of school in handcuffs. For bringing a homemade clock.
Ahmed has been invited to the White House.
Hmm? Oh, nuthinā, Teach. Just talkinā ābout Current Events. No, maāamā¦ (through narrowed eyes) ā¦weāre listeninā.
