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New York woman who pepper-sprayed Muslim Uber driver indicted for hate crime
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 31 Oct 2024
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Praying is not chanting. Somehow I doubt a Catholic saying a hail Mary would have ellicited the same response. It appears the DA agrees.
As to what happened, he was driving the car with the two passengers in the back seat. The driver and passengers were not talking to each other, or otherwise interacting. Video linked in the article shows her suddenly lunging towards him and spraying him in the face with pepper spray at point blank range.
Her friend tries to pull her off of him. He then tries to get out of the car, while she keeps spraying him, where he calls 911 and she's arrested.
Wait... your description doesn't include any praying either. Did he pray or not? It just looks like an attack.
It would make me uncomfortable if someone just started audibly praying while driving me though. Given the tone I might even take it as a threat on my life, if I felt like it was some "last rights" or "give me strength" shit that made me feel like they were about to off themselves with me in the car.
The solution would absolutely not be to pepper spray the driver though. That can only make my fears a reality.
That is an unhinged and deranged level of xenophobia.
Someone speaks foreign language
“Gasp! My life in in danger. I have been personally threatened.”
Making shit up online is fun. Strawman arguments don't convince anyone of anything though just makes you look like a tool.
Islam is the 2nd largest religion on Earth. It's not some piddly minority. When people are being weird Muslims it's okay to call them out the same way there are hella weird Christians and Jews. I would say NOT doing so and handling a particular groups weirdos with kids gloves is just as xenophobic (but obviously not as harmful) as attacking someone for being different.
You're basically saying they are less human than you and therefor should be excused from behaving normally in the society they are a part of, like they were a small child.
*kid gloves
They're called kid gloves because they're made from baby goat.
The leather from baby goats is soft and supple and gives you more dexterity than normal leather gloves. If you were handling something that needed great care, you might want to wear kid gloves to have greater manual control.
Why would you handle someone with kids' gloves? Are your hands very tiny?
There's nothing abnormal about speaking a foreign language or praying. For all you know, he could have been praying for a safe journey.
(Or praying for the endurance to put up with a shitty passenger.)
Read my responses for the answer, pedant.
There is something abnormal about praying in a workplace. They shouldn't be attacked, but it's also not normal. I don't care what religion they're a part of, it would be strange regardless.
How other people pray is none of your business. You don't get to decide what is "normal". If other peoples' prayers upset you, then you can die mad for all I care.
I don't have to decide what is normal. I can experience what is normal. I don't get mad when people pray, I just don't like it done in front of me while I am trapped in a small space with them.
So what you're saying is that you get mad when people pray.
No... I get annoyed when people put me in position where I have no reason to expect them to start praying, and the only method of distancing myself from that act would be extraordinary inconvenient for me.
Pray 20 hours a day for all I care, to whatever God you want. Leave me out of it.
Unless I'm paying them to take me somewhere, then it's definitely my business why they aren't doing that.
Shit is rarely just black and white as much as we'd all like that to be the case.
What an absolutely awful person you are...
If other people's cultures and religions offend you, stay inside and remain alone, for all of our sakes.
Who said anything about offended? Now piss off concern troll.
Explain. There is no xenophobia in my comment. Which "other" am I referring to? Lemmy trolls pearl clutching again. Get real.
Muslim man: *prays*
You: "I TAKE THAT AS A THREAT ON MY LIFE!"
Ain't got a problem with Muslims. Got a problem with audibly praying while you're driving me. Just like I'd have a problem with you having an intimate personal phone call with me in the car.
I sincerely hope you do not own any pepper spray.
I'm sure they're real torn up that some dumbass on the Internet is disappointed in them 🤣
I mean, I don't think they're 'some dumbass,' I don't know them well enough, but I'm not especially torn up.
Some of us actually engage with each other rather frequently because of how small the active user base really is.
I’m not sure I’d call what you said “engaging.”
What did I say? I mean I've been having lots of engagement with people today. Mostly people pretending I have something against Muslims and then telling me what else I must think based on their imaginary impression of me.
The removed comment is in the mod log. It wasn’t kind at all.
I didn't say it was kind. I said it was engaging. But calling someone a disappointment is alot kinder than implying they're a racist who might assault someone, but I'm living in reality and not just the Lemmy dreamsphere.
You said:
Those people are right. You are xenophobic against certain religions and cultures, and demand that people conceal their identities around you. By making this point in defense of a woman who pepper sprayed a man for praying, you're making it abundantly clear that you think violence is an acceptable response to seeing another person pray. You've also suggested that praying is somehow a warning sign of violence, which given the fact that the victim in this story was Muslim, clearly reflects what you think of Muslims and their faith.
You've jumped to conclusions. My statements weren't in defense of her actions, they were an example of what it would take to make me concerned for my safety which was not present if the facts given. To rephrase:
"If someone started acting suicidal, or like someone was going to die, while driving the car I'm in, I'd fear for my life."
You know how people pontificate online about what it would take to make someone's crazy behavior happen? And to express where you might draw the line in a similar but still hypothetical situation? Yeah that's all this was.
There's no hate for any particular religion within me, besides the generic atheist dislike for extremists that harm others.
Then you shouldn't be a taxi/Uber/etc driver.
Because i don't have a problem with Muslims?
Assuming something malicious is happening because a language is used when its not yours sounds exactly like xenophobia
Didn't express a muslim prayer in my response. Actually referenced common Christian phrases. The xenophobia is all in your mind.
He apprently was praying when she attacked him. Being Muslim, he needs to pray several times a day to stay devout. It's likely he was reciting one of those prayers.
It looks clear that he was speaking in Arabic and she took that to mean that he should be viciously attacked. It's unlikely she knew it was a prayer, so your religious fears above likely dont apply.
Hmm bad Muslim then, as I'm lead to believe from all the Muslims friends I have. You specifically don't need to pray while traveling. Actively driving would obviously qualify.
I'm not going to speak to whether he was required to pray in that instance or not, but the fact remains she heard Arabic from a Muslim man and attacked him.
I assume him being a "bad Muslim" in your eyes doesn't excuse the attack, right?
I already said it was wrong. Just because someone is a victim doesn't make their behavior also not wrong though. There's a time and a place for religious behavior.
Per the first amendment, that time and place are whenever and wherever you want. I'd assume that applies to inside of your own damn car.
Not when your car is your workplace. We've seen what happens when people are allowed to practice their religion however they please. Being 2 feet away from someone in a moving vehicle that you've paid for transportation in is not appropriate. We've learned the 1st amendment doesn't permit you to practice your religion under whatever circumstances you wish. ALSO the law should never be used as a barometer for right and wrong. We often hope it aligns but far too often we see it does not.
So according to you praying randomly is bad religious behavior? Maybe he's going through something and a silent prayer gives him relief.
If it were silent prayer they wouldn't have known he was doing it unless his hands were off the wheel while driving, which would be concerning in its own right.
Randomly praying in private is fine. Praying on the job in the middle of the task you are paid for is fucking weird and bad. It's an Uber driver. Fares are very rarely over 30 minutes and probably more commonly less. Pray in between. There is no doctrine mandating it at such an interval that it would interfere with this work in a way that would require special allowances. IN FACT, there are special allowances within the religion that permit not adhering to the 5 prayer routine during acts of travel or when it could be deemed unsafe, all of which would apply to the act of driving.
But why? What if this dude feels personally called to speak with god for several hours a day? I’d consider Uber a fairly adaptable job that works for that.
There’s a difference between weird and bad. Is it weird to pray aloud in front of others? A little, I guess, but that’s not a reason that he shouldn’t do it and it doesn’t make it bad.
If that's their compulsion they can do it while not actively working. In between pickups etc. I personally find it obnoxiously pious to make others unwilling participants in your praying. A person's driver is in too intimate a setting to be doing stuff like that.
I wouldn't give a shit if they were a bus driver though because that's already a more public environment where I'm not expecting the driver to be talking to me if they are talking. (I also find it annoying when the driver is on the phone in an Uber for similar reasons). If they were being annoying I have the ability to move myself a little further out of earshot. In a private car, the only way to avoid it is to end the ride and find a new one, which would be incredibly inconvenient.
They can legally also do it while working, though. It’s their car and they’re not an employee, so Uber certainly can’t tell them not to. I guess I don’t really see what you’re trying to say: do you want him to not be allowed to pray while working, or do you just think it’s a dick move? If the latter, do you think it’s reasonable to pepper spray him for it?
I’ve got misophonia, and sometimes people make sounds that make me super uncomfortable. In an Uber- style situation, I tend to just politely ask them not to (unless it’s a breathing sound, in which case I just try to distract myself)), which has never not worked.
I just think it's a dick move, and as already stated explicitly by me, they should not be pepper sprayed or attacked in any way. This is a "playing music out loud on a bus" level of annoyance.
Are you actually trying to argue that praying is justification for pepper spraying someone?
What a completely unhinged fantasy world you live in where everyone who prays is out to kill you. What a hateful person you are.
Nope didn't argue either of those things. You've just made that up.
They quoted you, lol
And added some of their own commentary
Yes, with their own interpretation afterwords. What he quoted was me giving examples of things that would concern me, not a recitation of the events of the article.
One of the ways your average literate person could know that was by the way I didn't cite the article in any way or the fact that I was describing circumstances with examples unrelated to the Muslim faith.
The first portion quoted was a response to someone saying he was praying and then when recounting the story they made no mention of praying. I asked for clarification because they literally excuded the information they implied was present. Then Lemmy started hallucinating.