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Taxi Union Urges Racial Profiling Of Passengers
By
Jaya Saxena
Published Dec 7, 2010
Modified Dec 7, 2010
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By
Jaya Saxena
Published Dec 7, 2010
Modified Dec 7, 2010
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Now that the suspect in Friday night's livery cab driver shooting has been identified as Hispanic (at least from a black and white surveillance video), the New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers is telling drivers to racially profile their passengers. Union head Fernando Mateo said, "I don't care about racial profiling. You know, sometimes it is good we are racially profiled, because the God's honest truth is that 99 percent of the people that are robbing, stealing, killing these drivers are blacks and Hispanics." But it's OK for him to say that because he's Hispanic!
In fact, he basically justified it that way to AMNY, elaborating, "Clearly everyone knows I’m not racist. I’m Hispanic and my father is black. ... My father is blacker than Al Sharpton.” He also told the Post, "I'm asking black and Hispanic people to profile their own, so how the hell can this be racist?" But racist or not, people have opinions! TLC Commissioner David Yassky said, "Choosing which passengers to serve on the basis of race is illegal, downright wrong and simply unacceptable," and one car service owner, "Crime is not being created because of black, white, purple. It has nothing to do with color."
Even not-as-black-as-Mateo's-dad Al Sharpton chimed in, saying, “To start saying ... we’re going to scapegoat people based on race, I think exacerbates the problem." But Mateo did find an ally in Curtis Silwa, founder of the Guardian Angels. He accused anyone disagreeing with Mateo of not dealing "with reality...or they live in Leave It to Beaver, Little House on the Prairie Land." Or just a land where cab drivers should pay attention to suspicious behavior, not race?
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fernando mateo
new york federation of taxi drivers
racial profiling
Jaya Saxena
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