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Comment by rajbot | Hacker News Reader

They knew it was not a bomb. They were bullying him. If the school or police had actually thought it was dangerous they would have:

1. Evacuated the school 2. Called the bomb squad

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I bet if you broke it down 80% of police activity would be saving face and putting on airs

Their justification is in the linked PDF: "Under Texas law, a person is guilty of possessing a hoax bomb if he possesses a device that is intended to cause anyone to be alarmed or a reaction of any type by law enforcement officers."

This is another way that governments (those with the monopoly of the use of force) expand their reach.

By putting the precipice of wrongdoing not on what happened but on the reaction of state agents, it becomes extremely difficult to call out bullies like this.

I read that line as more along the lines of yelling "fire" in a movie theater. Clearly there was no intent of causing hysteria with Ahmed's suitcase clock, which I assume is why he was freed. But, clearly, this shouldn't have gone as far as it did.

But there was zero evidence of any such intent in this case.

So I found a five year old photo of mine on Flickr - I'm glad I wasn't a muslim schoolkid in Texas when I wrote that second paragraph in the Flickr description:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/bigiain/5162711688/

(Also now waiting for the first reports of a muslim being convicted of a "bomb hoax" for carrying a pepper grinder, on the grounds that it "cause a sneeze reaction in a law enforcement officer"...)

I'm not entirely sure what your photo has to do with anything.

It's a home built clock.

I think in Texas that'd make me suspicious - and I think that's _insane_.

But you even said if you had put it in a suitcase it would look like a bomb...

I think the point here is or ought to be that there are a lot of things that are completely normal that might be mistaken for a bomb by the ignorant or the uneducated. And no, that's not an excuse for the Irving ISD or Irving PD peoples' actions either since we expect them to be neither ignorant nor uneducated.

@fnordfnordfnord To my knowledge, no one has asserted this was ever a bomb. This is all about the zero-tolerance policy public schools appear to be applying to situations like this and others (see: gun shaped pop-tart). Hopefully situations like this give reason to begin discussions about rethinking the way we treat children in an environment where this kind of activity should be encouraged, not punished.

It was not intended to even be seen by police, let alone alarm them or cause a reaction.

Probably not the first time this joke will be made, but...

"I'm impressed - I didn't realise Ahmed had built a clock with a functional alarm."

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