Last weekend a proud 9th Grader constructed an electronic clock at home, and he brought it to school on Monday. Naturally, he was handcuffed and arrested. That’s natural in Irving Texas, anyway — if the student’s name is something like Ahmed Mohamed.
14-year-old Ahmed showed his clock to a teacher who decided it was a bomb and called the principal, who called the police; they put Ahmed in handcuffs, took him in and fingerprinted him. Now they’re saying they arrested Ahmed for staging a bomb hoax; clearly they should have arrested his teacher and principal for that. All charges against Ahmed have been dropped; we can expect civil suits against Irving’s government and school district.
The city of Irving, part of the DFW Metroplex, brags about the large high-tech firms located within its limits. There may be more welcoming places for those multinational companies and their culturally- diverse workforces, towns where those employees and their families would not be regarded with hate and suspicion.
More:
“Texas schoolboy handcuffed for bringing homemade clock to school,” Alex Hern, The Guardian
“Texas High School Student Shows Off Homemade Clock, Gets Handcuffed,” Bill Chappell, NPR News
“A clock is not a bomb. Ahmed’s arrest and why we can’t have nice things.” Alexandra Petri, Washington Post
“Muslim ninth grader arrested for bringing an electronics project to school,” Timothy B. Lee, Vox
“Ahmed Mohamed swept up, ‘hoax bomb’ charges swept away as Irving teen’s story floods social media,” Avi Selk, Dallas Morning News
“Outcry after Muslim teen is detained over homemade clock,” David Warren and Jamie Stengle, Associated Press
“The Ahmed Mohamed fiasco: When racial stereotyping meets scientific illiteracy,” Ryan Cooper, The Week
“14-year-old arrested after homemade clock is mistaken for bomb, prompts #IStandWithAhmed on Twitter,” Colleen Shalby, PBS News Hour
“Why a ninth-grader’s arrest over a home-built clock struck a chord across America,” Abby Phillip and Sarah Kaplan, Washington Post
“Obama invites Texas boy – and his clock – for visit as authorities defend arrest,” Jessica Glenza and Nicky Woolf, The Guardian
“Handcuffed for Making Clock, Ahmed Mohamed, 14, Wins Time With Obama,” Manny Fernandez and Christine Hauser, New York Times
“The internet and Barack Obama are standing up for Ahmed Mohamed, the teenage clockmaker,” Annalisa Merelli, Quartz
“Ahmed Mohamed says he’s going to the White House — and then he’s transferring schools,” Casey Newton, The Verge
“9 Ways the World Is Supporting Ahmed Mohamed,” Shaunacy Ferro, Mental Floss
“Silicon Valley stands with teen clockmaker Ahmed Mohamed.” Matt O’Brien, SiliconBeat
“Ahmed Mohamed Shows Why Makers and Hackers Care So Much About ‘Freedom to Tinker,’” Lily Hay Newman, Slate
“Ahmed isn’t alone: Well-behaved minority boys more likely to be imprisoned than white troublemakers,” Max Ehrenfreund, Washington Post
“Texas principal sends awful letter to parents after Ahmed Mohamed was wrongfully arrested,” Kwame Opam, The Verge
“Ahmed Mohamed: it’s a clock with a built-in racism detector,” Andrew Marlton, The Guardian
“The clock kid: Ahmed Mohamed now at center of culture war rumble,” Justin Wm. Moyer, Washington Post
“Clock kid keeps ticking — and so does media interest,” Justin Wm. Moyer, Washington Post
Related:
“#IStandWithAhmed and the Criminalization of the American Schoolyard,” Jared Keller, Pacific Standard
“End zero-tolerance school discipline,” Malcolm Harris, Al Jazeera America
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Tags: Ahmed Mohamed, clocks, engineering, fearmongering, Irving Texas, Islamophobia, istandwithahmed, schools, STEM education, Texas
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