Do you all have relatives that forward you the stupidest, most offensive emails ever written? I love my uncle dearly, but he has the habit. I just got the one from him, which you've probably seen, about how racial profiling of Muslim males at airport security is justified, and we should leave the little old ladies, kids, and Congressmen alone. It comes in the form of a ten-question quiz on who was responsible for various infamous acts of terror over the past thirty years.

Well, sometimes I go off my nut a little when I get thoughtless tripe like this in my inbox, especially from someone who knows that I and at least two other relatives on his mailing list have vastly different political beliefs from your average Mormon Republican.

So I reply-all'd the following:

Right, let's stop searching everyone at airport security, because no white person would *ever* try to blow up a plane. We Caucasians concentrate on Federal buildings like the one in Oklahoma City instead. In fact, let's not stop at profiling in airports. I won't be happy until the nice Pakistani man who owns the grocery store on my corner is in an internment camp with his wife and children. And I like the Egyptian restaurant over on Steinway Street so much that I think I'll go smash it up with a baseball bat.

The second we start singling people out for special treatment because of the color of their skin or their religious beliefs is the second that the Bill of Rights stops protecting any of us. Don't forget there was a time when Mormons were seen as a threat to America, and I don't think any of us would want a return to days like those.

So if you're concerned about airport security, then hitch up your trousers, stop complaining, and submit to the same security procedures as your Muslim neighbors. This is America, and we should all bear the burden of security together.