Everybody profiles every day. The word "discriminate" used to be acceptable until it was appropriated by the Civil Rights movement. The common definition of "street smart" is being able to quickly profile a person. The nagging question is how far government can stretch the Constitution and profile a citizen in order to protect society from injury or harm ...or not. The question has never been answered.
Nice post and I agree. It's one thing when the civilians profile. We are all guilty of that to a degree. It's another thing entirely when the authorities do it and it has a lot of potential to be abused for political reasons.
Being personally victimized by NYPDs "Stop and Frisk" policy, I can tell you it gets out of hand. I was nearly arrested for asking why. They said because I had a laptop case and a camera bag strapped to my back that I fit the profile of someone who could plant a bomb in a subway. I refused and kept walking and they grabbed me, took off my stuff and started searching it. They not only looked in my bag but turned on my laptop and demanded my password. My response was, "The password is Go **** Yourself." While I was standing there, they were contemplating charging me with failure to cooperate with a police officer.
They rightfully came to the conclusion that I would not let it go and would probably sue the NYPD and they did not want the publicity since they get sued every week by people they search. To top it off, while searching my stuff, they took the lens off my camera and put their fingers all over my sensor. Rendering my expensive DSLR useless for the day. I had to spend $65 to get it cleaned.
I am a white guy. They just decided out of the blue to single me out with zero probable cause. This a a blatant violation of the 4th amendment.