What is wrong with racial and ethnic profiling if it will prevent a terror attack?

[ToriAllen]

The main problem with it is that it creates a precedent, which will forever be used by law enforcement to single out people of various races.

It's just not a good idea.

How is that a bad idea? Each race, social class, age group, and sex has particular crimes that are more likely to be committed by those particular people. That is a fact of life that can not be changed by anyone outside of each of those individual groups. Profiling is a very technical concept and a lot more goes into it than just, "It's an Arab! Grab him!" There are volumes of books written on the subject and it is used every day by law enforcement. For a precedent to be set it would have to be a new concept but the truth is, it is a very old concept. If there were a reason other than hurt feelings I could understand, but as times change and our enemies change we must also evolve to counter the new threats. If white men went around hijacking planes and blowing themselves and others up then we would be profiling white men. There is nothing racist or prejudice about it. If a person of any race other than Middle Eastern would care to change the profiling then go hijack a plane or blow yourself up in a public place.