Guess who’s coming to dinner

by Barbara Miller

Whoever was in charge of protecting the Obamas at their first state dinner made several mistakes, including what might be called reverse profiling. A striking blond, white woman in a glittering red and gold lehenga-style sari, along with her appropriately dressed male escort, sashayed her way into the White House on November 25th. She vamped for a photo with some Marines and got up close and smiley with Rahm Emanuel and Vice President Biden. A photo of her in the receiving line with President Obama shows her holding his outstretched hand in both of hers.

Michaele Salahi looked and acted the part of someone who might be invited to the event. But she and her husband are frauds, opportunists, aspiring reality tv stars, and…trespassers.

Cultural anthropologists and other social scientists have expressed concerns about racial and ethnic profiling, especially since the 9/11 events in the US. The Henry Louis Gates incident in July brought a flare-up of commentary.

Racial/ethnic profiling seeks to pinpoint people who are dangerous to society, who have evil intent, who plan to violate the law. It is crude and its effectiveness is debatable.  One problem with racial/ethnic profiling is that it steers the gaze of security people toward certain types of people and, thus, necessarily away from other types of people who are deemed of less concern.

So an attractive, glittering blond woman gets to shake the president’s hand. It is totally improbable to think that a similarly attractive blond woman wearing a burqa could have crashed the state dinner party. No way.  She would have been profiled, questioned, and perhaps detained at the first checkpoint.

What’s the lesson here? Attractive, appropriately dressed white people who aspire to be on reality tv should be carefully watched as they could have bad intentions.

Picture adapted from a photo from the CBC.