Viral Video Seeming To Show Muslim Profiling By NYPD Was Staged
The motive seems to be killing two birds with one stone -- the larger one of them being greed.
The Smoking Gun has the story:
OCTOBER 21--In a cynical and duplicitous attempt to capitalize on New York City's documented racial profiling problems, a pair of bloggers have created a video purporting to show an NYPD officer stopping and frisking a pair of Muslim men for the crime of wearing traditional Islamic garments.But the viral video is a sham, a staged production aimed to go viral and pile up views and YouTube channel subscriptions for its young creators, Brooklynites Adam Saleh and Sheikh Akbar, who get a piece of the revenue generated by ads that run before their videos play.
TSG asks the right questions about the supposed cop on the video:
Oddly, the officer never bothers to remove the item to confirm that it is a phone and not a deadly weapon. Also, the cop does not appear concerned that Saleh's friend is hovering directly behind him.
If you know anything about cops or even watch a cop show or two, you probably find these actions a little unbelievable -- especially the friend hanging out behind the cop doing the frisking.
10/21 TSG UPDATE:
In an interview yesterday with Capital New York, a spokesperson for Saleh and Akbar claimed that he had "behind the scene footage" proving that the profiling episode was not faked. Asked for additional details, the flack told reporter Azi Paybarah, "We can't give out details for follow ups--it breaches confidentiality."However, despite that shaky assurance, the videographers copped to their perfidy (albeit sneakily) after TSG exposed their hoax this morning. They edited the video's YouTube description to report that the clip was a "Dramatization of previous events that occurred with us in our tradition clothing while filming in NYC. This video is not against the NYPD." The video's original description claimed that Saleh and Akbar were prompted to expose the NYPD after "we kept getting followed by Police. So we decided to film this social experiment on racial profiling." The duo added that, "Too many innocent people get stopped and frisked" daily due to their clothing and skin color.
There is no institution immune to this temptation. CBS TVs "60 minutes" is not required to present facts objectively – it is not a news program.
I have found people are very reluctant to discriminate between an information source and an editorial.
Radwaste at October 23, 2014 3:12 AM
It is clear from the get-go that this was a fake video for 2 reasons:
1) the first time when they started pushing, the cop stood by and did nothing. Nope, NYC cops would be on that in a heart beat.
2) "Why are you dressed like that" I never heard any cop say that; especially in NYC were all manner of dress is on display.
Also, Amy, having lived in NYC you most likely know (and I wonder if the same might be true in LA) no one but a cop can wear a cop uniform in public in NYC. The only exception are actors who have to have a special license to wear a cop uniform in public - even when being part of a street filming they must have that license.
As a side note, this is one reason why so many cop shows from the past had many of the minor roles played by the same actors. The city limits the number of such "cop uniform" licenses they issue; so, the film makers might as well hire the same actors who already hold those licenses for the smaller parts for a TV show or movie.
It would be interesting to see if this "cop" was a real cop or was he someone who had such a license. Or, was he someone breaking the law by wearing a cop uniform in public without the proper license? And if so, where did he get the uniform?
It isn't clear enough in the video to see if that is a NYPD uniform; but, only those with a NYPD ID can purchase a NYPD uniform from an authorized dealer; So, if it is an NYPD uniform, where did he get it from?
Charles at October 23, 2014 4:56 AM
Charles, I didn't know that about cop uniforms for filming.
And this probably helped:
Amy Alkon at October 23, 2014 6:33 AM
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