On Wednesday morning, the Internet converged on a story that left many observers baffled and enraged: Texas police arrested Ahmed Mohamed, a 14-year-old Muslim student, for bringing a homemade clock to his high school, on the grounds that it constituted a “hoax bomb.”
The incident sparked renewed discussion about Islamophobia in the U.S. Expressions of support for Mohamed poured in from engineers, as well as Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and President Barack Obama, both of whom offered to meet with the enterprising young student.
But all of this ignores the elephant in the room: How many other clocks out there might be bombs?
1) Big Ben
Actually, “Big Ben” is the name of the giant bell inside this clock, not the clock itself. What other secrets is this clock hiding?
2) Cuckoo clockThis clock hasn’t exploded and killed anyone just yet—but that doesn’t mean we can trust it, even for a split second.
3) SundialJust an innocent timepiece of yore? More like an ancient bomb.
4) Alarm clockSure, it didn’t detonate when it went off this morning. This morning.
5) Pebble WatchHonestly, we’re not even sure if a smartwatch counts as a clock. What we do know is that each one is a potentially deadly wearable bomb.
6) Grandfather clockWhy do you never see any grandmother clocks? Probably because they were all incinerated by bombs disguised as grandfather clocks.
7) Atomic clockA single clock like this could wipe out an entire city. Be afraid.
Photo via nathanmac87/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)
