Apparently, nothing in this world is scarier than math equations. Some of you might even be having frightening flashbacks to your school days right now. However, this woman on this American Airlines flight took it to the next level when she thought her seatmate was committing an act of terror by solving some equations.
Award-winning University of Pennsylvania economics professor, Guido Menzio, was removed from an American Airlines flight on Thursday after the woman sitting next to him flagged down a flight attendant, claiming to be ill. That should have set off the alarm bells for him perhaps.
The woman assumed the man she was sitting next to was Middle Eastern. He’s Italian. Idiot.
The plane was preparing for takeoff at the time, and with the woman’s report, the plane returned to the gate, where Menzio was removed from the plane and ushered to the FBI, who were awaiting his arrival.
So what was he doing? Apparently he was working on some differential equations while waiting for the flight to take off. That’s so scary, guys. I can’t even describe it.
He seems to be taking the whole situation in stride, much to his credit. He said:
“She thought I was a terrorist because I was writing strange things on a pad of paper. I laugh. I bring them back to the plane. I showed them my math.”
He claims to have been treated very respectfully by the FBI, and he was allowed to reboard the flight without incident. The woman, however, did not reboard the flight. She was probably too afraid to “take the risk.” The flight took off without incident, albeit about two hours behind schedule.
The story just goes to show how far the fear-mongering and racial profiling, or the profiling of anyone who isn’t white now, has gone. When a person a little darker skinned than you sitting next to you on a plane is doing math and you feel threatened by that, something is seriously wrong with you.
It has not been a good couple of months for American Airlines. They took a ton of flack last month as well when “The Young Turks” host Cenk Uygur was booted from a flight for recording their staff being rather standoffish with passengers after a red eye flight was delayed for hours. You can check out the first video in that long saga below.
Featured image is from Menzio’s Penn Economics bio page.
