Muslims should expect to be stopped....

[punky]

Originally Posted by andyl

1. So do you seriously think we shouldn't be signed up to and abide by internationally agreed Human Rights treaties. And yes, sorry, I do blame sensational, not forgetting right wing, journalism.

There is nothing wrong with signing up to internationally agreed human rights treaties, provided they are setup and run by sane, intelligent, reasonable people.

The UN and the EU are a joke. They are in no way capable of adminstering such treaties responsibly. An example on UN and human rights: The UN thought that Syria should be in a position to dictate to everyone who to run their own countries (until 2004 it was on the UN Security Council), when we aren't to send its citizens back there because they will get tortured. Well you can't have it both ways, either Syria is a fine and upstanding country, and we should be able to deport people back, or if it is violation of human rights laws, then it should be treated accordingly. Its funny, the UN was set up to avoid a repeat of WW2, and due to its extreme appeasement policy it will stand by and watch history repeat itself.

I like the way you fall back on that old chestnut, the "right-wing journalism". If you woke up with a spot one day, i'm sur you'd think that it is the Daily Mail's fault too.

3. If we're talking reasonable suspicion as grounds for stop and search then I'm at a loss as to why innocent Muslims would be targeted.

They won't be, but the BBC want to sensationalise it too. Yes, the left are actually as bad as the right.

What the MP said was no different than: "Innocent people will be convicted of murder". That doesn't mean the police will be going round fitting up innocent people for murder, but that it has happened, and will happen again, regardless of what you try and do. But that would be a reasonable and muted argument, and Auntie wouldn't like to put that on her news would she?

Parting shot:

STOPPED BY THE POLICE

Abdurahman Jafar, 32, London barrister

"My wife and I were driving through King's Cross. Police were stopping [non-white] people. I asked a policeman why. He said, 'There are a lot of people dealing drugs here'. I said, 'What's that got to do with me'? It was insulting. Just because I'm a certain colour ... the fact that he pinpoints me is horrible. It's humiliating. You don't feel part of the country you grew up in and love."

Lord Ahmed of Rotherham, 47

"Twice I've been stopped at British airports. Once I was travelling to the US from Heathrow with the Mayor of Lahore. We both had beards and brown skin. Out of 65 mostly white people we were picked out. The other time I was travelling from Birmingham to Saudi Arabia with my wife and was asked if I was taking any money with me. When I said I was, they wanted bank receipts to prove it was mine."

Michael Eboda, 41, editor of New Nation

"I was stopped and searched by 30 armed officers in 2003; I was told it was because I was black and driving a high-value vehicle. If it really was intelligence-led policing and improved communities that would be one thing, but it just antagonises people. The chance of stopping a person who is an Islamic terrorist is minimal. It is a waste of police time."


From today's Independent: http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/leg...p?story=616329




Unsubscribe.

[me283]

Originally Posted by andyl

1. So do you seriously think we shouldn't be signed up to and abide by internationally agreed Human Rights treaties. And yes, sorry, I do blame sensational, not forgetting right wing, journalism.

2. The SUS laws are totally relevant because the tactics being suggested are exactly the same. The recruitment of more ethnic minorities to the Police is not particularly relevant as this exercise hasn't exactly been covered in glory, numbers remain dispropritionately low and many forces acknowledge they are institutionally racist (which makes policing by consent in ethnic communities more difficult; application of stop and search will aggravate this and, as a result there will be less, not more, communication between the police and the people they serve and less useful information being passed on to them regarding criminal activity generally.) If policing does not have the support and consent of the community, it is doomed to fail.

3. If we're talking reasonable suspicion as grounds for stop and search then I'm at a loss as to why innocent Muslims would be targeted. If there are reasonable suspicions of terrorist activity I would not expect your average Plod to be doing a stop and search. It's an extraordinarily blunt and ineffective tool.

Leaving the obvious discrimination issues aside, history tells us this tactic WILL NOT WORK.

Of course if you want to damage community relations and prevent the forestalling and detection of crime, do bat on.

I've had enough of this. Bat on. Graham for President.

And you could also blame the disproportionate reporting of "institutionally racist police forces" on sensationalist journalism, and the same for your dredged up comments about SUS laws and the SPG.

As for the idea of "too low a proportion" of police officers from ethnic minorities, what do you suggest? We wait until the number is at a level considered good enough by lily-livered liberals, and then we start approaching the issues of policing ethnic morities? Or do we accept that "a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single footstep"?

Innocent people will be affected, as they always have been. But when you stop and search someone, you cannot be sure they are guilty. Hence, they may be innocent, and the stop and search may well prove that.
__________________

Originally Posted by andyl

Parting shot:

STOPPED BY THE POLICE

Abdurahman Jafar, 32, London barrister

"My wife and I were driving through King's Cross. Police were stopping [non-white] people. I asked a policeman why. He said, 'There are a lot of people dealing drugs here'. I said, 'What's that got to do with me'? It was insulting. Just because I'm a certain colour ... the fact that he pinpoints me is horrible. It's humiliating. You don't feel part of the country you grew up in and love."

Lord Ahmed of Rotherham, 47

"Twice I've been stopped at British airports. Once I was travelling to the US from Heathrow with the Mayor of Lahore. We both had beards and brown skin. Out of 65 mostly white people we were picked out. The other time I was travelling from Birmingham to Saudi Arabia with my wife and was asked if I was taking any money with me. When I said I was, they wanted bank receipts to prove it was mine."

Michael Eboda, 41, editor of New Nation

"I was stopped and searched by 30 armed officers in 2003; I was told it was because I was black and driving a high-value vehicle. If it really was intelligence-led policing and improved communities that would be one thing, but it just antagonises people. The chance of stopping a person who is an Islamic terrorist is minimal. It is a waste of police time."


From today's Independent: http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/leg...p?story=616329




Unsubscribe.

And there we have it... it's because they are black/Asian/coloured. Obviously. It couldn't be (in the first instance) that perhaps he fitted a description of a known or reported drug dealer?

I lived in an area where EVERY arrest of anyone from an Asian/black/ethnic minority background was touted as being racist, however guilty the person was. You get used to it. Us realists accept it as people chancing their arm; liberal types throw up their arms, as if the police just do it for kicks (when on occasion, that's what they end up receiving).

[clairey]

Transcript of the committee hearing were Ms Blears spoke



http://www.parliament.the-stationery...-v/uc16502.htm

Originally Posted by punky

Without informants, how would you find out anything, without invading privacy?

I have already answered this. You even quoted my words!

We already said that informants can't be relied upon for the sole source of intelligence.

Of course informants can't be relied on for the *sole* source of intelligence, but I have never suggested that they *could*!

So what are these "many other sources"? If you know a better way of gathering intelligence that is both informative, but doesn't break people's right to privacy, why not share it with MI5? Or if not them, then share it with me.

Punky, exactly *what* point are you trying to make here? Are you actually discussing the topic or just banging on about this in the hope of finding some contradiction in what I have said so you can denounce me as a hypocrite?

Aside from informants, which we discussed was not substiantial enough to be solely relied upon,

Again you're talking about something being "solely" relied on, but again I have never said that anything *should* be solely relied on!
__________________

Originally Posted by me283

I really don't think we should be quoting the European Human Rights legislation here. Week in and week out, one hears and reads of examples of this pathetic legislature allowing the so called "human rights" of particular groups or individuals to trample on the lives of others, who presumably have less "human rights". And please don't blame sensationalist journalism here.

Would you care to back that up with some cites? Or is it just that because *you* don't agree with their verdicts that they're "pathetic"?

As with the SUS law in the 70s, quoting an area of policing from the 80s is equally defunct. Why not quote the police efforts to recruit more officers from ethnic minorities during the 90s and 2000s? After all it's more recent and hence more relevant... but then it doesn't really fit your argument, does it?

If you really think that human attitudes have changed so massively in the last twenty or thirty years then I wish I lived in the same world that you did.

I agree that recruiting officers from minorities is a good start, but even that isn't sufficient, not to mention that racism is still evident amongst recruits:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3207899.stm

But that's from 2003, is that not recent enough to fit *your* arguments?

But it's the last point that interests me most: you talk about "reasonable suspicion", yet that is what this is all about. It has not been declared that EVERY Muslim will be stopped, questioned and searched whenever they leave home. It seems clear to me that what is being said is that people may be detained and questioned more often, and that there is a strong chance that there will be a larger proportion of Muslims among this element. But I think you will find that for someone to be detained and questioned, there will need to be suspicion in the first place.

Yes, but the point is that, as has been suggested already in this this thread, that "suspicion" can start with four Muslim looking men in a van near an airport.

Would that "suspicion" still exist if they were white? Hell, even if they were black they would probably not be considered potential terrorists!

So, you are happy for a "suspect" to have their phone tapped (currently illegal under normal circumstances I believe), but not for them to be questioned (currently legal I believe)?

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

1) Phone tapping is entirely legal under strict guidelines and approval from the Home Secretary.

2) I would be happy for people's phones to be tapped provided adequate grounds for the tap were provided and it was not simply done as a "fishing expedition" and

3) I would be happy for people to be questioned *provided* it was for something more than looking "suspiciously Muslim".

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by me283

And you could also blame the disproportionate reporting of "institutionally racist police forces" on sensationalist journalism, and the same for your dredged up comments about SUS laws and the SPG.

As for the idea of "too low a proportion" of police officers from ethnic minorities, what do you suggest? We wait until the number is at a level considered good enough by lily-livered liberals, and then we start approaching the issues of policing ethnic morities? Or do we accept that "a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single footstep"?

Innocent people will be affected, as they always have been. But when you stop and search someone, you cannot be sure they are guilty. Hence, they may be innocent, and the stop and search may well prove that.
__________________



And there we have it... it's because they are black/Asian/coloured. Obviously. It couldn't be (in the first instance) that perhaps he fitted a description of a known or reported drug dealer?

I lived in an area where EVERY arrest of anyone from an Asian/black/ethnic minority background was touted as being racist, however guilty the person was. You get used to it. Us realists accept it as people chancing their arm; liberal types throw up their arms, as if the police just do it for kicks (when on occasion, that's what they end up receiving).

A very good post

Originally Posted by Ramrod

You seem to be ignoring generally accepted history

linky
linky
linky etc....etc....

All of which are about appeasement and NONE of which are *anything* to do with The Holocaust, nor do they demonstrate the slightest causal link between the two.

As for you saying 'prove a link' between appeasement and subsequent nazi, that can't conclusively be done (you would need a paralell universe) but it is generally historically accepted that the link is there.

By whom? None of your above cites demonstrate any such acceptance.

So my saying that perhaps watching the muslim community more closely is 'worth a try' is the same as you saying that they should be shot?!

Except if you go back and *read* the thread you'll note that we were not *talking* about simply "perhaps watching the Muslim community more closely"!

Originally Posted by Ramrod

Who knows.....worth a try don't you think?

I think it's safe to say the line could be drawn somewhere before shooting them.[/QUOTE]

But not before locking them up based purely on suspicion without trial, evidence or justice...
__________________

Originally Posted by andyl

Graham for President.

Are you *kidding*?!

There is no way I'd ever want *that* job...!!!

[punky]

Graham:

Intelligence that doesn't come from informants, apart from odd lucky breaks I mentioned before is "fishing" and as stated by you, is against an individual's right to privacy. Your phone taps example needs intelligence, so you can get the phone tap to get the intelligence you needed in the first place. Chicken-and-egg again. I am still waiting for you to mention any intelligence source that doesn't abuse an individual's right to privacy and doesn't rely on informants.

You said there were "many", so it can't be that hard.

Originally Posted by clairey

Transcript of the committee hearing were Ms Blears spoke

Thank you for posting that, I tried looking for it yesterday, but was unable to find it :-(

I would draw people's attention to the following section:

Originally Posted by Hazel Blears

Dealing with the counter-terrorist threat and the fact that at the moment the threat is most likely to come from those people associated with an extreme form of Islam, or falsely hiding behind Islam, if you like, in terms of justifying their activities, inevitably means that some of our counter-terrorist powers will be disproportionately experienced by people in the Muslim community. That is the reality of the situation, we should acknowledge that reality and then try to have as open, as honest and as transparent a debate with the community as we can. There is no getting away from the fact that if you are trying to counter the threat, because the threat at the moment is in a particular place, then your activity is going to be targeted in that way.

Now as far as I can see it clearly states that activity is a) falling disproportionately on the Muslim Community and b) that activity is being *targetted* towards that community.

She may not have explicitly said that Muslims should "accept" this, but I feel that is definitely very implicit in the statement "That is the reality of the situation, we should acknowledge that reality..."
__________________

Originally Posted by me283

Innocent people will be affected, as they always have been. But when you stop and search someone, you cannot be sure they are guilty. Hence, they may be innocent, and the stop and search may well prove that.

But, as I keep pointing out, you must have *reasonable grounds* for suspicion before doing a stop and search.

And "looking suspiciously like a Muslim" are *not* reasonable grounds.

Originally Posted by andyl

Parting shot:

STOPPED BY THE POLICE

And there we have it... it's because they are black/Asian/coloured. Obviously. It couldn't be (in the first instance) that perhaps he fitted a description of a known or reported drug dealer?[/quote]

"Fitted the description"?

"Well, Officer, he was black/ looked like a Muslim/ dressed in funny foreign clothes..."

I lived in an area where EVERY arrest of anyone from an Asian/black/ethnic minority background was touted as being racist, however guilty the person was. You get used to it. Us realists accept it as people chancing their arm; liberal types throw up their arms, as if the police just do it for kicks (when on occasion, that's what they end up receiving).

So because *some* make claims that "it was racist", you narrow-minded types (see, I can sling personal insults around too) are willing to dismiss *all* such claims as nothing more than "people chancing their arm" whereas us open-minded types want to consider the bigger picture and note that there *IS* institutional racism in the Police as has been evinced several times already.
__________________

Originally Posted by punky

Intelligence that doesn't come from informants, apart from odd lucky breaks I mentioned before is "fishing" and as stated by you, is against an individual's right to privacy.

Yes, if you are doing it based on nothing more than a vague suspicion or because you don't like what the guy looks like/ what religion he espouses.

Your phone taps example needs intelligence, so you can get the phone tap to get the intelligence you needed in the first place. Chicken-and-egg again. I am still waiting for you to mention any intelligence source that doesn't abuse an individual's right to privacy and doesn't rely on informants.

You said there were "many", so it can't be that hard.

Oh Punky, I can almost *see* you there at your keyboard going "Hah! I've got him! I've finally nailed Graham on a point he can't answer...!!"

But consider, for a moment, a Muslim Cleric who is preaching "death to the West". How about getting a Muslim Police officer to infiltrate his followers and associates and check out whether he or any of them are planning to do more than just shout slogans?

Or what about checking through his rubbish (not illegal) for documentation or materials that suggest terrorist intent?

Then again, if there is someone you are *already* investigating (and, possibly, whose phone you are legitimately tapping) and they phone up said Cleric and talk to him about planned action or in coded terms, that *would* give reasonable suspicion *without* invading privacy and would justify further investigation.

Are these sufficient to answer your question?

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Graham

I would draw people's attention to the following section:

Now as far as I can see it clearly states that activity is a) falling disproportionately on the Muslim Community and b) that activity is being *targetted* towards that community.

As far as I see it, there is a women telling it like it is.

a)The threat is from Islamic terrorists, therefore it is not very clever using your "resources" surveiling Jews, Bhuddists, Christians, Wiccans etc Of course compared to those other religions there will be a disproportionate experience.

I don't see how there could possibly a proportionate experience

b)Of course its targetted at that community, what other community should they target.

[punky]

Originally Posted by Graham

Are these sufficient to answer your question?

You don't consider that, although legal, that going through people's rubbish to be an invaison of their privacy? If I went round and took everyone's rubbish, read their letters, looked at what products they use, to be an abuse of their human rights? I'd consider going through everyone's rubbish in case they are criminals to be much the same as intercepting everyone's phone calls, wether it happens to be legal or not. And if this is widespread, wouldn't everyone just destroy their rubbish anyway making it completely ineffective as an intelligence source?

Also, successful undercover agents are even fewer and further between than informants.

[me283]

Originally Posted by Pierre

A very good post

Thank you Pierre.
__________________

Originally Posted by Graham

And there we have it... it's because they are black/Asian/coloured. Obviously. It couldn't be (in the first instance) that perhaps he fitted a description of a known or reported drug dealer?

"Fitted the description"?

"Well, Officer, he was black/ looked like a Muslim/ dressed in funny foreign clothes..."



So because *some* make claims that "it was racist", you narrow-minded types (see, I can sling personal insults around too) are willing to dismiss *all* such claims as nothing more than "people chancing their arm" whereas us open-minded types want to consider the bigger picture and note that there *IS* institutional racism in the Police as has been evinced several times already.
[/QUOTE]

Do you know this to be the case? Or could it be the guy was wearing similar or even identical clothing to a suspect? Maybe his hair was the same? Your flip response shows merely that you are trying to muddy the waters here. Instead of just bleating that someone MUST have been arrested or questioned because he was black/Asian, why not check the facts and find out why it happened? Or is there a fear that there could be some perfectly reasonable justification?

In response to your second point: so "some" police have been guilty of racism you are willing to accept that "all" police forces are riddled with bigots and racists?

Believe me, I have seen incidents time and time again where "racism" is cited when it was clearly not apparent. I have seen blacks accuse Asian officers of racism, whites accuse black officers of racism, etc etc. It's time you got to grips with it: racism is not all against blacks or Asians. If there was a perceived threat that a skinhead group were seriously intent upon torching a mosque or sikh temple, then you might find police attention "targetted" at that particular social group. I doubt you would be up in arms about that?

Originally Posted by Pierre

As far as I see it, there is a women telling it like it is.

In other words: "Hey, Muslims, other people who call themselves Muslim are being naughty boys, so we're going to target your entire group to be on the safe side. Deal with it"
__________________

Originally Posted by punky

You don't consider that, although legal, that going through people's rubbish to be an invaison of their privacy?

If you are worried (as you should be, but for reasons of ID theft, not "national security") that someone was going to go through your rubbish, shred it before you throw it away.

But what would you have us do? If a binman sees something written on a piece of paper that he's just chucked in the back of the wagon and reads it, should he be arrested for breach of privacy???

I'd consider going through everyone's rubbish in case they are criminals to be much the same as intercepting everyone's phone calls, wether it happens to be legal or not.

Where did I say "everyone"? Oops, I didn't.

Also, successful undercover agents are even fewer and further between than informants.

Irrelevant. You asked for an alternative method, I gave one.
__________________

Do you know this to be the case?

No, but I refer you to the logical fallacy of the Burden of Proof as mentioned earlier in the thread. *You* have made the suggestion "It couldn't be (in the first instance) that perhaps he fitted a description of a known or reported drug dealer?"

Well, yes, it *could* have been the case. But you will have to prove your side before asking me to prove mine.

Your flip response shows merely that you are trying to muddy the waters here. Instead of just bleating that someone MUST have been arrested or questioned because he was black/Asian, why not check the facts and find out why it happened? Or is there a fear that there could be some perfectly reasonable justification?

Burden of Proof...

In response to your second point: so "some" police have been guilty of racism you are willing to accept that "all" police forces are riddled with bigots and racists?

Again, prove that they are not.

If there was a perceived threat that a skinhead group were seriously intent upon torching a mosque or sikh temple, then you might find police attention "targetted" at that particular social group. I doubt you would be up in arms about that?

If there are *reasonable grounds* for suspecting a particular skinhead group, no, I would have no objection.

But going from the suggestions in this thread it idea seems to be that *all* skinheads would be targetted and treated as suspects, whether there is any proof or not.

*THAT* I would object to.

[me283]

Originally Posted by Graham

In other words: "Hey, Muslims, other people who call themselves Muslim are being naughty boys, so we're going to target your entire group to be on the safe side. Deal with it"
__________________



If you are worried (as you should be, but for reasons of ID theft, not "national security") that someone was going to go through your rubbish, shred it before you throw it away.

But what would you have us do? If a binman sees something written on a piece of paper that he's just chucked in the back of the wagon and reads it, should he be arrested for breach of privacy???



Where did I say "everyone"? Oops, I didn't.



Irrelevant. You asked for an alternative method, I gave one.
__________________



No, but I refer you to the logical fallacy of the Burden of Proof as mentioned earlier in the thread. *You* have made the suggestion "It couldn't be (in the first instance) that perhaps he fitted a description of a known or reported drug dealer?"

Well, yes, it *could* have been the case. But you will have to prove your side before asking me to prove mine.



Burden of Proof...



Again, prove that they are not.



If there are *reasonable grounds* for suspecting a particular skinhead group, no, I would have no objection.

But going from the suggestions in this thread it idea seems to be that *all* skinheads would be targetted and treated as suspects, whether there is any proof or not.

*THAT* I would object to.

Burden of proof? OK, try this: some police officers are racist... prove that they all are.

And next time you see a gang of skinheads stood outside a Mosque with a gallon or ten of petrol and some matches, chanting about death... prove that they aren't on their way to a barbecue whilst reciting the lyrics to some heavy metal songs.

Get real will you? If you go through life justifying everything you do in advance, you will do nothing. Why? Because you cannot justify the unknown. The 9/11 pilots could have been mid-air joyriders ny your logic. It was only when they hit the Twin Towers that they became genocidal maniacs. Or could you have "proven" that was their intention far enough in advance?

[punky]

Anyone watching "This Week" right now? Paul Ross is making some extremely good arguments in favour of house arrest, terrorism prevention, etc.