I was searching through my dose of international news when I came across this: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/14/us-plane-prayers-idUSTRE72D4ZV20110314 I don't know if I was stunned or horrified that the airline crew hadn't the slightest idea what these guys were doing and probably assumed that they were small group of terrorists, especially those of the Islam faith. Opinions?
How are they supposed to be knowledgeable of every prayer ritual? Was it eventually necessary to alert the authorities? No. But it's best to err on the side of caution when dealing with the unknown. Additionally, Judaism is not a part of the Islamic faith.
Its kinda sad that nobody else on the plane ever said a thing on what they're doing. It's also kinda sad that they didn't know what they were doing. Unfortunately, with this, its reasonable to be cautious.
Wow, the ignorance is palpable. Were there no other Jews on the plane who could've explained what was going on? I swear this country is getting more Occicentric all the time.
They're both wrong. The guys praying were wrong because I think people need to keep their religion to themselves, and the flight crew was wrong because someone praying isn't grounds to declare an emergency. And really? There were no other Jews on the plane who could recognize that and say it was OK? I was raised in a very reform Jewish upbringing (reform Jews don't do that crap) and am not even a practicing or believing Jew, but I would recognize that as a standard prayer ritual for orthodox Jews. Did anyone on the plane speak up? Or were they promptly ignored by the irrational fears of the flight crew? And now, the question I have, if this crazy lady was doing that on a plane, would anyone blink an eye? Doubt it. The Jews were not singled out because of the odd ritual or the foreign language, they were singled out probably because they had beards, wore funny hats and had un-American sounding names and it was assumed they were Muslim. And of course, if a Muslim is on a plane, they must be up to something, right?
To me, it's not outrageous to think that it's possible that there weren't other Jews on the plane. The Jewish population in LA/Mexico isn't large by any means. With that said, it does seem like the flight attendants overreacted a little. Couldn't they have just asked them what they were doing? I'm sure the prayers could have easily proved that they were praying. Then again, why did they have to pray right then and there? They couldn't wait a couple of hours to do it in the comfort of their home/hotel room?
I hate to say it, but orthodox Jews are kinda crazy. The worshipping regimen of Jewish orthodoxy is so utterly anal, that there are prayers for when you go to the bathroom successfully, and there are many prayers that have to be done at a very specific time in the day and cannot be done any earlier or later. And for God's sake there's a sun prayer, which was done a couple years back and which won't be repeated in another 30 years or so. Edit: Found it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birkat_Hachama
I mean, obviously they had the right to pray, but shouldn't they think in their own minds that doing that on an airplane isn't exactly the best idea? but then again, maybe they had to pray at that certain time and had no way around it. also, am I the only one who thinks the idea of a Mexican Jew is funny?
1. They probably had to at that specific time. I've been on flights to and from Israel and you see this sort of thing regularly. 2. What's so funny about a Mexican Jew?
See guys? Now we're ripping Jews off planes! ISLAMOPHOBIA no more! I also want to point out that even though they must have been "lawl stoopid racist 'Murikans XD', it's actually incredibly hard to confused an Orthodox Jew with a Muslim.
I'm not saying it was profiling and by rights it probably shouldn't be that hard to tell them apart, but that's not really accounting for how ignorant people can be.
Counterpoint; compare how many Americans would be familiar with Sikhism and how many would be familiar with Jews.
Good point. Whether we're talking percentages or absolute numbers there are probably more Jews than Sikhs in America, and their religion and practices are more culturally prevalent in the West than Sikhism would be.
Counterpoint: that has nothing to do with what I was saying. It was an example of how just because something can seem simple it doesn't mean everyone realises that.
Most people only know their own religion and it's probably true that they'd lump everything else together. I have no idea what Islamic, Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish, etc. prayers consist of and would definitely just lump them all together if somebody asked me which religion it was.