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Politics aside, if targeting and killing civilians indiscriminately is not terrorism, I don't know what is. ETA: I'm talking about the Paris attacks specifical

by raquo 11y ago

Politics aside, if targeting and killing civilians indiscriminately is not terrorism, I don't know what is. ETA: I'm talking about the Paris attacks specifically, not giving a formal definition of terrorism. If you don't count those as terrorism, I don't know what you would count. This semantic mumbo jumbo is ridiculous.

rurounijones 11y ago
By the definition you gave above: * Bombing of Dresden: Terrorism * Nuking of Hiroshima: Terrorism * America's Drone strikes: Terrorism Context and motive is everything. You cannot boil it down to an easily digestible soubd-byte to base your opinion on.
- grandalf 11y ago
  Don't forget shooting at redcoats from behind the cover of a tree during the revolutionary war.
- themartorana 11y ago
  Yes you can. Hiroshima was in the midst of a full blown state vs. state war, in which the US was not the aggressor against Japan. While it is true that it was hoped the atomic bomb would be as useful psychologically as it was physically, there is no true comparison here, and this is argumentative for the sake of trying to make a point.
  - aianus 11y ago
    > there is no true comparison here You're right, the Hiroshima attack in itself was worse in terms of the death and suffering of innocents than all Islamic terrorism of the past 20 years put together.
    - grandalf 11y ago
      True. Ironically, it's generally understood by Americans that this was done to break Japan's will to continue fighting. It worked. Everything we do in war is to break the will of the enemy to continue. Thus unless we expect one side to nobly surrender, we ought to expect the most extreme atrocities to occur in war. When you think about it, it's silly to draw an arbitrary distinction of humane combat, since if we really wanted to be humane we'd have our leaders compete in chess boxing or something that would minimize the destruction of property and loss of life.
- raquo 11y ago
  I'm not claiming to give a formal definition of terrorism, I'm just saying that if such a definition exists it should definitely include the Paris attacks, otherwise it would be meaningless. Regardless of that, the events that you mentioned are massive, coordinated, state-level actions. I just can't accept labeling those as terrorism without that word losing any meaning. Yes, those events are horrible, but not every horrible thing that involves killing civilians is terrorism even when if's brutal mass murder. There are other words too, like genocide, war crimes, massacre, assassinations, etc.

by raquo 11y ago

rurounijones 11y ago

By the definition you gave above: * Bombing of Dresden: Terrorism * Nuking of Hiroshima: Terrorism * America's Drone strikes: Terrorism Context and motive is everything. You cannot boil it down to an easily digestible soubd-byte to base your opinion on.

grandalf 11y ago
Don't forget shooting at redcoats from behind the cover of a tree during the revolutionary war.
themartorana 11y ago
Yes you can. Hiroshima was in the midst of a full blown state vs. state war, in which the US was not the aggressor against Japan. While it is true that it was hoped the atomic bomb would be as useful psychologically as it was physically, there is no true comparison here, and this is argumentative for the sake of trying to make a point.
- aianus 11y ago
  > there is no true comparison here You're right, the Hiroshima attack in itself was worse in terms of the death and suffering of innocents than all Islamic terrorism of the past 20 years put together.
  - grandalf 11y ago
    True. Ironically, it's generally understood by Americans that this was done to break Japan's will to continue fighting. It worked. Everything we do in war is to break the will of the enemy to continue. Thus unless we expect one side to nobly surrender, we ought to expect the most extreme atrocities to occur in war. When you think about it, it's silly to draw an arbitrary distinction of humane combat, since if we really wanted to be humane we'd have our leaders compete in chess boxing or something that would minimize the destruction of property and loss of life.
raquo 11y ago
I'm not claiming to give a formal definition of terrorism, I'm just saying that if such a definition exists it should definitely include the Paris attacks, otherwise it would be meaningless. Regardless of that, the events that you mentioned are massive, coordinated, state-level actions. I just can't accept labeling those as terrorism without that word losing any meaning. Yes, those events are horrible, but not every horrible thing that involves killing civilians is terrorism even when if's brutal mass murder. There are other words too, like genocide, war crimes, massacre, assassinations, etc.