EDITORIAL: We're all victims, Mr Singh

LOUIS PIERARD
The complaint by Hawke's Bay Sikh priests, who were briefly deprived of their ceremonial knives during a journey to Napier in the interests of in-flight security, is understandable. But no more so than anyone who has been forced to yield to anti-terrorism rules that forbid the presence of any potential weapon in an aircraft - and that has included even toenail clippers and hairbrushes.
Hastings priest Jarnail Singh is mistaken in his claim that the fuss highlights the racism his community has faced since the bombing of New York's twin towers.
The word "racism" trips too easily from the tongue. While it is unlikely that an archbishop holding a crook would have led to fellow passengers assuming the worst, it is not racism.
It is, thanks to the enthusiasm for indiscriminate slaughter of innocent people by Islamic extremists, a deep fear of the unknown. And while Mr Singh makes the point that he has a turban (not an Arabic keffiyeh), any terrorist worth his or her salt would be certain to adopt a disguise. A Carmelite with an Armalite, perhaps?
Although travellers to provincial airports (inexplicably) escape the usual rigorous scrutiny made of those flying to major metropolitan areas, it is nevertheless asking a bit much to be able to walk onto an aircraft with a Sikh dagger, or "kirpan", tucked under one's shirt.
Even Mr Singh ought to accept that it would be extremely odd for passengers, forced to use plastic cutlery (which are almost useless for eating with as they would be for threatening with violence) to tolerate the presence of someone wearing a large blade? Remember one of the 7/11 aircraft, Flight 93, which thanks to the heroic sacrifice of its passengers crashed well short of its target, was hijacked by terrorists using noting more lethal than craft knives.
Along with Sikh priests, all our lives have been made more difficult by casual killers prepared to die for a cause.
Innocence and freedoms are lost in the interests of self-preservation. While New Zealand must be far from the thoughts of international terrorists, prudence dictates it would be foolish not to be cautious for just that very reason.
That is why we are have to walk onto international flight cabins with our personal effects in a plastic bag; why babies' and medicine bottles are automatically treated as suspect just in case they contain liquid explosives and why sharp objects, regardless of their intended purpose, are routinely confiscated.