No matter what you think of Gov. Scott Walker as the leader of Wisconsin, he has responded well to the outrageous comments of another politician in the wake of the Brussels terrorist attack.

On the other hand, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, made comments calling for law enforcement to focus patrols on Muslim neighborhoods specifically in hopes of preventing radical influence from infiltrating the U.S.

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Unfortunately, targeting a group of American citizens based on their race or religion is a practice with a basis in U.S. history.

Flash back to World War II. Japanese-Americans were expelled from their homes and sent to internment camps in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor to “protect” the rest of the American people. Granted, that was roughly 70 years ago, but considering the way our nation’s prospective leaders have reacted to the recent Brussels attack, it is not unreasonable to think that internment camps could make a comeback in some form.

While it goes without saying that everyone wants to see the end of terrorism, specifically targeting a community solely based on the religion of its members is not the best way to go about doing it.

Furthermore, anyone can be a terrorist. Take the Unabomber, for example: a Harvard educated, white, Chicago-born man named Ted Kaczynski terrorized the American public with a variety of bombings through the 1980s and onward.

And political leaders saying anything resembling “watch out for your Muslim neighbors” will undoubtedly create a divide between Muslim Americans and the rest of the American population. It’s not hard to see that this separation can easily turn into fear, which would inevitably turn into hatred.

In contrast, Walker last week in response to Cruz’s ideas continued to call for all Wisconsin citizens to report any suspicious activity of any persons through the “See Something, Say Something” campaign, rather than implementing heavier police actions in communities of specific religions.

Acts of terrorism are acts of hatred, and profiling entire communities based on their religions can only lead to hatred, which will not solve anything. People need to be aware of the current situation in our world today, but our country’s leaders cannot sew the seeds of hatred in our society to prevent acts that ultimately stem from the same hatred.

Well done on this one, Walker.

Phil Michaelson ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in biomedical engineering.