dave_j

There are a number of issues surrounding the BBC story concerning the delaying of an internal US flight:
Flight delayed after passenger becomes suspicious of equation - BBC News
The woman involved probably mistook the darkish skin of the italian for a middle eastern hue and reacted with complete irrationality. I haven't seen this on CNN but might have been viewed in the US.
The suspicion then moved her to concentrate on his writing and apparently was unable to recognise the script as a mathematical differential equation.
The story highlights the paranoia being generated in the US towards anyone not immediately recognisable as being 'safe'.
For those who want to understand the darker side of this fear generation I recommend viewing the BBC documentary 'The power of nightmares'. It can be seen on Kodi and may be available on other systems.
In another place at another time, the woman involved in this story might very well have accosted the man with the business end of an AR15 and asked questions later.

scrubbedexpat091

While I cant say if CNN reported it, many US news agencies have.


There will always be ignorant passengers.

Of the total number of daily passengers vs those like this that are overly paranoid, seems to be a fairly small number who cause issues by being paranoid.

bats

I dunno, maths is pretty frightening

MillieF

For so very many people 'the unknown' was not too far far from their doorsteps. They didn't have to cope with it, why should they?

Spending my early years in the Midlands, the unknown came to us, from Uganda, and we coped, our tastes changed and encompassed spices and all manner of things we hadn't known previously. I then moved to London as I grew older and lived not far from Brick Lane, and then bought my first home in Stratford E15... Before it was popular. What a period of change....that part of London has always been home to newcomers. I miss that cultural chaos.

Today a young woman from NB was telling me that she had 'no desire' to ever visit Europe. She spat out the word 'Europe' like it might be infectious....but she hasn't ever travelled anywhere prior to all this nonsense...before, it was because she was too ignorant to ever want to travel....now, it's because she's too wise to ever want to do so....the world is going backwards....

caretaker

and some Italians I would postulate (stand back!) that the person complaining may have been super stressed because of flying. I know it's remote but some people can't fly without being absolutely terrified right below the surface.

Gordon Barlow

Getting ready to leave Australia, the land of my birth and upbringing (many years ago now), I intended to spend two or three years "seeing the world" - and if I liked it enough I might not come home at all. A friend of my Dad's told me confidently, "Oh, you'll be back all right!" What made him so sure, I asked. "Well, Australia's the greatest country in the world, isn't it!" that, from somebody who had never left the country.

More ignorance than fear, in his case.

BristolUK

Canadians say that too - not about Australia of course. It can't just be that "everyone" says it about their own country as an awful lot of Brits seem to prefer somewhere else.

Every time a Canadian asks me what brought me to Canada and I answer "a Canadian wife" (not literally as she'd not been outside North America) the response is always "they are the best."

Dorothy

My partner worked on a fly-in/fly-out basis for over 20 years. He's been in that many near misses and horrible flights that he's absolutely petrified to fly now. In order for him to get on the plane for our upcoming trip to Canada he's going to be heavily dosed with diazepam. On the outside he's a big, calm looking bloke. On the inside he's a wobbling mass of scared.

allegra

I have met people here in the GTA who have never been out of Ontario. Once I was in conversation with somebody who planned to retire to Florida. Had it all planned out. I asked whereabouts in Florida as I know it quite well. Answer was that he didn't know because he had never been there.

caretaker

What I meant; possibly rather than the woman really rationally believing there was anything insidious about the man's computer or profiling him (again, the Italians), it was a matter of her flipping out due to stress. That's the common thread I see in the reported incidents, sometimes fear compounded by drugs and alcohol.

allegra

You say 'she was too ignorant to ever want to travel' but don't you, in a way, envy such people? I do. Always wanted to travel and live in foreign parts and that is what I did. Always wanted to be somewhere else, would see a plane fly overhead and wish I was on it etc. etc. and restless for best part of my life. In a way I actually envy people who are happy with their lot and content to stay where they are and not seek out any adventure in their lives. 'Rolling stones gather no moss.........'

Oink

We all live in ignorance and fear, they’re helpful survival responses. Our brains trick us into thinking that we can make almost perfect sense of external phenomena when we can’t, it’s called the illusion of confidence. We actually do a pretty poor job understanding the world around us, there are far too many variables for us to comprehend so in a sense ignorance is beneficial, if we understood more, we'd probably never get out of bed. Plato was wrong, we’re much better off staring at the shadows rather than understanding the true nature of things. We couldn’t cope without being delusional, you’d never take any risks. So for your 60 to 80 years of existence, enjoy your ignorance.

scrubbedexpat091

Anytime I get asked where I am from and say San Diego, I get why did you move to Canada and a perplexed look.

Hardly ever to the reason why.

caretaker

I guess they think you moved out of a fantasy theme park. When they closed Marineland of the Pacific and moved the whales to San Diego Seaworld the place got a reputation for the theme park. Prior to that I'd heard of the zoo, and assumed it must be a good one, and other than that it was all about the armed forces, Marines and Navy in a big big way.

scrubbedexpat091

Marines and Navy are still large there. I beleive San Diego is the largest on the west coast Marine and Navy wise.

Since the fall of the traditional economy of military manufacturing and fishing that occured in the 80s and 90s the region has had to diversify and they have fairly siccessfully with tourisim being a big part of it.

With 70 miles of beaches and mildest weather on the west coast and possibly all of North America, makes for a nice vacation spot.

And the zoo is nearly always in the top 5 worldwide zoos in surveys. Completely non profit as well and not run by the city although the city does technically own the land and everything on it but the city doesnt run it or provide the funding.

For economic purposes San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico can be considred one metro area. Both regions are very connected to one another economically.