DOUBLE TROUBLE

A kid in Texas gets arrested for bringing a home made digital clock to school. I knew a teenager who built a working computer in a cardboard box. He called it "The Homeless Computer" and carried it in his backpack.

It never occurred to me to advise him that he could be arrested for carrying his cardboard computer to school. Of course, he was blond, so I was less worried about him being arrested.

Like all prejudicial actors, the school and the local cops are saying, "He did not cooperate, all he would tell us was that it was a CLOCK." (Of course, it WAS a clock.) It is surprisingly easy to justify your prejudices by finding some law or rule that the victim violated.

People are correct when they say that prejudice is disappearing in the US. If you have only ONE reason that people can be prejudiced, then things are pretty OK.

But if you are Brown, a nerd and a Muslim, then you can be totally misjudged.

If you are disabled and fat, then people feel free to ignore or harass you.

If you are Brown, a married gay, and a deported felon, the appellate court will twist the law to rule against you.

The Texas kid will be OK. He will get to go to Google, Facebook and the White House. A NASA tour is in his future.

But all those kids with double and triple trouble, those we have to help.

A good start is to laugh at our silly fear of circuit boards and APOLOGIZE to the person who was misjudged due to prejudice.