BBC: Travels with my beard

[mrfrapp]

After the 7 July London bombings could growing a beard completely change the way people treated a British Asian? There was only one way to find out.

[snip]

But it was people in authority, whose role it was to be alert, who were the most suspicious. It seemed now I had a beard - and for the first time in my life - members of the Metropolitan Police thought I looked dodgy.

I wasn't sure whether the two were connected. So when I was stopped by police outside Downing Street, and searched yet again, I asked one of them the question: "Do I look dodgy?" The answer was a very definite yes.

"Would I look less dodgy without my rucksack?" I asked. "Dodgy," he replied. "What about if I wore a suit?" "You'd look like a dodgy bloke in a suit," he said. "How about if I shaved my beard?" "Dodgy. Just face it - you look dodgy," came the disconcerting reply.

[snip]

Does making sweeping generalisations make us any safer? No, said John O'Connor, who was in charge of the Met police flying squad in the late 1980s when London faced the threat of the IRA. He told me a terrorist will always do the unexpected and we shouldn't fall into the trap of having reassuring stereotypes.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4666132.stm