Tick tock: time to cut those Yanks a bit of slack

It was the perfect story to show just how stupid, ignorant, racist and Islamophobic the Americans are. And did I mention stupid?

I'm referring to when 14-year-old American-Sudanese Ahmend Mohamed was arrested because some idiot teacher thought a clock he had made for a school project looked like a bomb and had him arrested.

Jeez, those Yanks sure are dumb, huh?

Except the truth is more complex. The kid didn't make it as a school project, he brought it in to school of his own volition. One of his teachers saw it and simply told him to put it away because it looked like a bomb, but he refused.

When he was told that cops would be called if he didn't put it away, he refused.

When the cops arrived he refused to answer any questions.

Is it any wonder that, in America of all places, he was arrested? This is a country which sees school murders on a worryingly regular basis, they have such a ridiculous zero-tolerance policy on weapons that one kid was sent home from school for pretending to use a Pop Tart as a gun and even kids who make 'bang-bang' gestures face being suspended for 'creating an unsafe environment' - that's the climate into which this kid brought his 'invention.'

Now, it emerges that his sister was previously suspended from the same school for threatening to blow it up. And it almost goes without saying that their father, who also just happens to be a Muslim activist was quick to shriek Islamphobia.

So let's put the shoe on the other foot. If a white kid brought something that looked like a bomb into school and behaved as oddly, would he have any support?

Nope, didn't think so...