Osama bin Laden killed not only thousands of lives, but also millions of dreams. In addition to the invaluable amount of intellectual capital taken away at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon or the number of troops sacrificed in Iraq & Afghanistan, the dreams of foreign citizens to pursue their careers or simply have a nice vacation in the United States (a minor issue compared to the first two) were also ‘killed’. Osama triggered the American government to impose strict sanctions against immigrants through implementing more rigorous VISA selection process and security measures, which in turn added to the difficulty of foreign citizens to gain residency.
(by the way, I have a lot of homework but am trying hard to publish this article on September 11th [US time]..I am rushing through this so please ignore grammatical mistakes or typos..hahaha)
Since 9/11, obtaining a US Visa has been exceedingly difficult for Indonesian job seekers, vacationers, and even students. But even those fortunate individuals who made it through the selection process at the US Embassy were still faced with further challenges as they stepped into the soil of negeri Paman Sam.
In December 2003, it took my family about three hours of questioning at Los Angeles LAX’s airport security while the Australian man who sat next to my family on our Singapore Airlines flight could easily pass through the security in a heartbeat. Despite the fact that my father during that time was working for an American company, he was still questioned by airport security for hours. And why? All because of his green Indonesian passport which showed that he was a citizen of a predominantly muslim country.
In 2009, a similar case occurred (well I mean, it happens everyday)..But this time, it made it to the headlines because the airport security ‘victim’ was Mr. Bollywood star, Sharukh Khan. According to CNN on August 15 2009, “Leading Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan says he was detained for nearly two hours Friday night at New Jersey’s Newark International Airport because of his last name.” Of course, those airport security officers were simply abiding by their tasks..Ironically, however, Sharukh Khan at that time was filming a movie about racial profiling, “My Name is Khan”.
In addition to the increase of airport security measures, the United States congress also introduced the USA Patriot Act, or the ‘Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act’. This act was implemented in 2001 (precisely 8 weeks after the attacks) by the Bush administration for the purpose of strengthening the US security and expanding the scope of the US surveillance and criminal justice system (details here: http://www.fincen.gov/statutes_regs/patriot/index.html). In addition, Bush’s administration also created the Guantanamo Bay (or shall I say, the ultimate hub of human rights violations in the developing world), a detention facility located in Cuba for the purpose of holding detainees from the Iraq & Afghanistan war.
How did US citizens react to the implementation of these new policies? Multiple law suits concerning the constitutional nature of racial profiling and privacy violations were made against the US government by various entities, mostly American citizens with ethnic backgrounds and also non-profit organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), an advocacy group focusing on individual rights. ACLU ‘challenges the constitutionality of Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, which vastly expands the power of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to obtain records and other ‘tangible things’ of people not suspected of criminal activity’.
What about a decade later aka today?
While the Bush Administration was more strict in immigration policies (and obviously more aggressive militarily), Obama’s Administration has made several significant changes. These changes include his decision to abolish the Guantanamo Bay (hurray human rights!). On May this year, however, Obama signed a four-year extension upon specific policies included in the USA Patriot Act, which include: ’roving wiretaps, searches of business records, and conducting surveillance of individuals suspected of terrorist-related activities not linked to terrorist groups’.
What does this mean for us Indonesians? Well..the exceedingly high number of qualified VISA applicants who are surging the United States along with the tragic state of the United States economy are among the multiple factors behind the difficulty of obtaining a US VISA for us today..But it is fairly easy to say that a decade later, our ability to step foot on the land of opportunity without risking racial discrimination due to our nation’s muslim affiliation is still greatly impacted by this event (thank God I’m already here?? hehe) (source)
(by the way, I have a lot of homework but am trying hard to publish this article on September 11th [US time]..I am rushing through this so please ignore grammatical mistakes or typos..hahaha)
Since 9/11, obtaining a US Visa has been exceedingly difficult for Indonesian job seekers, vacationers, and even students. But even those fortunate individuals who made it through the selection process at the US Embassy were still faced with further challenges as they stepped into the soil of negeri Paman Sam.
In December 2003, it took my family about three hours of questioning at Los Angeles LAX’s airport security while the Australian man who sat next to my family on our Singapore Airlines flight could easily pass through the security in a heartbeat. Despite the fact that my father during that time was working for an American company, he was still questioned by airport security for hours. And why? All because of his green Indonesian passport which showed that he was a citizen of a predominantly muslim country.
In 2009, a similar case occurred (well I mean, it happens everyday)..But this time, it made it to the headlines because the airport security ‘victim’ was Mr. Bollywood star, Sharukh Khan. According to CNN on August 15 2009, “Leading Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan says he was detained for nearly two hours Friday night at New Jersey’s Newark International Airport because of his last name.” Of course, those airport security officers were simply abiding by their tasks..Ironically, however, Sharukh Khan at that time was filming a movie about racial profiling, “My Name is Khan”.
In addition to the increase of airport security measures, the United States congress also introduced the USA Patriot Act, or the ‘Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act’. This act was implemented in 2001 (precisely 8 weeks after the attacks) by the Bush administration for the purpose of strengthening the US security and expanding the scope of the US surveillance and criminal justice system (details here: http://www.fincen.gov/statutes_regs/patriot/index.html). In addition, Bush’s administration also created the Guantanamo Bay (or shall I say, the ultimate hub of human rights violations in the developing world), a detention facility located in Cuba for the purpose of holding detainees from the Iraq & Afghanistan war.
How did US citizens react to the implementation of these new policies? Multiple law suits concerning the constitutional nature of racial profiling and privacy violations were made against the US government by various entities, mostly American citizens with ethnic backgrounds and also non-profit organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), an advocacy group focusing on individual rights. ACLU ‘challenges the constitutionality of Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, which vastly expands the power of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to obtain records and other ‘tangible things’ of people not suspected of criminal activity’.
What about a decade later aka today?
While the Bush Administration was more strict in immigration policies (and obviously more aggressive militarily), Obama’s Administration has made several significant changes. These changes include his decision to abolish the Guantanamo Bay (hurray human rights!). On May this year, however, Obama signed a four-year extension upon specific policies included in the USA Patriot Act, which include: ’roving wiretaps, searches of business records, and conducting surveillance of individuals suspected of terrorist-related activities not linked to terrorist groups’.
What does this mean for us Indonesians? Well..the exceedingly high number of qualified VISA applicants who are surging the United States along with the tragic state of the United States economy are among the multiple factors behind the difficulty of obtaining a US VISA for us today..But it is fairly easy to say that a decade later, our ability to step foot on the land of opportunity without risking racial discrimination due to our nation’s muslim affiliation is still greatly impacted by this event (thank God I’m already here?? hehe) (source)
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