[Dryerase] The Alarm!--Eye on the INS 10-4-02

[The Alarm!Newswire]

Put down the newspaper and step away from the water cooler

By Michelle Stewart
The Alarm! Newspaper Collective

It is easy to read a headline and become outraged. If the story is 
exceptionally sensational, the names and details will remain in the 
press for a few days—maybe a week at the most. However, all to a 
commonly the outrage fades as the media turns its attention to a new 
“top” story.

We forget that behind the headlines are people who still have to live 
their lives after the camera crews leave.

On September 12, 2002 one nurse from Georgia and three Muslim men 
traveling to Florida captured the public imagination. As the story 
unfolded, we were given the tale of a woman who overheard a discussion, 
called the police and became a national hero. Of the men, we were given 
a story of three medical students who played a “prank” on a restaurant 
snoop. The end result of their chance encounter was a widely-publicized 
traffic stop that resulted in the shutdown of a major highway in 
Florida, a 17-hour detention, the loss of internships and a lot of 
primetime cable squabbling on behalf of both parties. And then a new 
story. That week’s big story was the Alligator Alley traffic stop; last 
week it was Madelyne Gorman Toogood (the mother who was caught beating 
her child on a department store surveillance camera). The story of the 
three medical students is filed into the archives of our collective 
memory.

Of course, it should come as no surprise that the story did not end 
with the final coverage of it on CNN. Indeed the tale continues as 
Eunice Stone tries to fade out of the public eye—the controversy 
reportedly caused her so much stress she had to be hospitalized—and the 
three medical students Ayman Gheith, 27, Kambiz Butt, 25 and Omar 
Choudhary, 23 continue their battle to clear their names.

Last week Altaf Ali, director of the Florida chapter of the Council on 
American-Islamic Relations, reported that the three students had come 
to an agreement with Larkin Community Hospital in Florida to be allowed 
to continue their internships, at nearby hospitals and doctor’s offices.

In a related matter, Dr. Enrique Fernandez, another doctor from Larkin, 
claims he was removed from his post when he attempted to assist the 
three students in finding another hospital in the Miami area to host 
them. As one of the coordinators of the three men’s education, 
Fernandez worked through Ross University in Chicago to arrange the 
internship in Florida. He was notified a week ago that his position was 
terminated without notice. Larkin/Ross claim the decision was an 
internal matter.

Another related, though muffled, matter is coming from local law 
enforcement who have stated the 17-hour incident was the most expensive 
traffic stop in the history of Florida. At a cost of $100,000, law 
enforcement is also reeling in the wake of Eunice Stone’s phone call 
from Georgia.

But this is the information that is not so interesting to the 
public—where the students do their internship, or who will pay for the 
costly traffic stop is not the stuff of water cooler discussions in the 
workplace. And why is that?

How many words in this column, in the New York Times, Los Angeles 
Times, La Opinion will have to be devoted to stories of immigrants 
dying in the desert before we respond, how many more stories, words, 
articles about racial profiling in airports, fingerprinting men from 
Middle-Eastern countries, INS detainees? And the list goes on.  How 
many times can the story be told, with different names and places, 
before we, as the general public, get off our collective derrières and 
respond?

Many of us pick up the paper everyday, we skim the headlines, we nod or 
shake our heads depending on the stories—we often follow the stories 
for a day or two if we are interested. Yet we do nothing but read the 
story. If we are enraged we might tell a friend.

Picking up the newspaper everyday to become momentarily annoyed is 
ludicrous; as we allow ourselves to become increasingly complacent the 
landscape is changing.

It is easy to lounge about in this armchair-opinion existence when it 
is the rights of others being stripped (directly) and not our own. We 
are experiencing a nativist moment the likes of which may challenge the 
anti-immigration backlashes of the 20s and 50s. The borders of the US 
are rapidly slamming shut, the target is anyone who is not native born. 
Unabashedly, the federal government has placed an ethnic target on all 
that is Middle-Eastern or Arab—the public has joined suit and extended 
that honor to anyone of similar appearance. All the while INS continues 
to target Mexico and Central America’s migrants with equal diligence.

The federal government and its various agencies are doing a bang-up job 
of insuring people are both ostracized and targeted.  Do we as a public 
need to back them up with our passivity? Are we so submissive that we 
only read the headlines, shake our heads—silently thankful that their 
sights were not set on us? If so, our complacency is guaranteeing the 
government will be allowed to further expand its sights.

Since 9/11, the assault on immigrant rights has been colossal. However, 
the assault was mounted prior to the Twin Towers. Ideology and policy 
were not crafted in the past year. The history of immigration in the US 
is such that the “rights” of others are often left in the rubble. 
Consider the thousands who have died trying to cross into the US, the 
thousands detained or deported after 9/11. I believe if you truly 
consider these matters, you will find yourself reacting, rather than 
continuing the fleeting water cooler discussions.

      All content Copyleft © 2002 by The Alarm! Newspaper. Except where 
noted otherwise, this material may be copied and distributed freely in 
whole or in part by anyone except where used for commercial purposes or 
by government agencies.