
“Clock Boy” Sues the Conservative Media World
One of 2015’s most unusual stories was the saga of Ahmed Mohamed, a Texas teenager who was arrested after bringing a homemade clock to his high school. The clock, which bore an undeniable resemblance to a makeshift bomb, was not well received. Mohamed was told by one teacher to put the clock away, but he ignored that advice and showed it off in class, where another teacher mistook the clock for an explosive device. Mohamed ultimately wound up in handcuffs, inspiring cries of racial profiling and Islamophobia from legions of social justice warriors.
The incident turned Mohamed into a minor celebrity; he even got to travel to Washington, D.C. to meet President Obama. But while liberals were attacking the staff at Mohamed’s Irving high school and painting Texas as a swamp of ignorance, some conservative media analysts weren’t buying the official story.
Writer Ben Shapiro said the whole incident was a “hoax.” Glenn Beck said it was probably a conspiracy meant to “turn Texas blue.” Jim Hanson of the Center for Security Policy said it was nothing more than a “PR stunt.”
Now Clock Boy is ready for his revenge. His family has filed a lawsuit against Beck, Shapiro, Hanson, Fox News, Irving Mayor Beth Van Duyne, and Ben Ferguson, alleging damage to their reputation resulting from libel.
“The Mohamed family are peaceful Muslims who have been falsely accused of being terrorists and engaging in a jihad,” the lawsuit reads. “The correction must also be made that the arrest and suspension of Ahmed Mohamed was not a stunt and it was not pre-planned, staged, or engineered by anyone, including [the father].”
This is the second lawsuit the Mohamed family has filed; they have also sued the City of Irvine and the school district in federal court.
In the current suit against conservative media, the family insists that many Americans have the wrong idea about what happened last year.
“The public has been misled into believing that the Mohameds are terrorists who plotted to have the Irving police wrongfully arrest a teenage boy for bringing an alarm clock to school,” reads the filing. “These broadcasts irresponsibly fan the flames of fear and anger toward Muslims and immigrants.”
These conservative commentators are the ones responsible for “fear and anger toward Muslims?” Damn, all this time, we thought it had something to do with the bi-weekly terrorist attacks carried out in the name of Islam.
Our courts make libel lawsuits very difficult to win, seeing as how they can trigger a chilling effect that undermines the Constitution. Then again, in the modern era, where half the judges in the country are worried more about pushing a social agenda than they are about following the law, who knows? Maybe some liberal judge will try to make an example out of Beck and company. Make a big stand against Islamophobia.
File all the suits you want. Make all the discrimination laws you want. Shut down free speech, go nuts.
But until Islamic terrorists stop killing innocent people by the thousands, Muslim kids who bring bomb-looking materials to school are going to be regarded with suspicion, Americans are going to fear this religion, and Middle Eastern refugees will remain unwelcome. Fair? Not fair? It makes no difference. That’s the score.
Ball’s in your court, Islamic community.