Tick-Tock: ‘Bomb’ Makes Explosive Impact

ANGELA YANG
Editor in Chief

As different as each individual is, there has been a point in all of our lives when we had one very common interest at heart: we all wanted to be astronauts or innovative engineers at some point or another. Many of us grew up to recognize this as a pipe dream, the fabric of daydreams. For me, it was encountering the number 12 on the multiplication table in third grade that made me realize the harsh reality of how much I dislike math.

Even so, there are those who have long held onto this dream, such as 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed. On Sept. 16, the Texas teenager eagerly brought a clock he had built himself to impress a teacher, only to end up in handcuffs and with a false accusation of bringing a bomb to school. National and global leaders such as President Obama, Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg and multiple NASA scientists reached out and provided words of encouragement and support to the young teen.

While it’s easy to jump to conclusions, it is clear that the teacher who reported Mohamed was simply doing her duty. She mistook the clock for a bomb and accordingly reported it to school authorities and the police. However, the problem lies in what transpired after. Irving police officers detained the teenager, as they were unaccepting of his answer that it was a clock. It is incredibly disconcerting to see that police officers were so untrusting of a young boy who was merely telling them the truth. Many have attributed this to racial profiling and Islamophobia, given Irving’s history of anti-Islamic sentiments, according to the Washington Post.

Ultimately, the parameters by which progress is defined should focus on the encouragement and support Mohamed has received, rather than the actions of the Irving Police Department officers who questioned him. It is extremely probable that, given Irving’s history, there was a degree of Islamophobia present in Mohamed’s case. However, it has been made evident that the outpouring of support for Mohamed across the world far outweighs the attitudes of Irving. Instead of focusing on the potential racial profiling, we should instead turn our attention to the many opportunities the young teenager is now exposed to and leave the biases of Irving in the dust.