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I think the "war on terror" is an idiotic phrase, so please don't ask me to defend it. The best I have is that some countries have decided to act against people

I think the "war on terror" is an idiotic phrase, so please don't ask me to defend it. The best I have is that some countries have decided to act against people who use terrorism. The reason why is that terrorism is a form of politics. You can either spend a lot of money and try to persuade a population to agree with your position or you can convince them to live in fear of your power and to do your will out of that fear. This, also, is why terrorism is such an existential threat. It's not because of the body count. It's because a very small number of terrorists can effectively hold hostage millions of voters. That breaks democratic forms of governance in bad ways. For what it's worth, I view the "war on terror" in much the same way as I view the "war on landmines", or the "war on poverty". "War" is so overloaded as to be meaningless. I think with terrorism you can at least offer a working definition and drive analysis further. With "war", it's such a mess that I think as a word it's useless now.

throwaway729 10y ago
Fair enough. Maybe calculated or coordinated is better than stealth. Which would perhaps exclude this attack (maybe, maybe not) but include e.g. organized and intentional white nationalists.
- DanielBMarkham 10y ago
  There's an implication here that there is some form of organized political desire that you are acting to further -- and that you are deliberately planning to further that effort. The KKK were terrorists. White bigots in the south were not. They were just bigots. Every stupid, angry, bigoted and violent person is not a terrorist. To me an almost classic example is that couple out in California that shot up those folks. They had planned for weeks, bought gear, posted online. They were even shooting video in order to publish of the attacks as they occurred. That's terrorism.
  - throwaway729 10y ago
    > There's an implication here that there is some form of organized political desire that you are acting to further -- and that you are deliberately planning to further that effort. In that case, I would argue that this attack fits your definition of terrorism. The political ideology is white nationalism clothed in Islamophobic garb. The immediate political desire is, in the attacker's own words, "get out of my country!" It's hard to argue that killing someone (and by extension making people like them fear for their safety) is not a deliberate and planned way of getting "them" -- both the individual and the group that individual supposedly represents -- out of your country.
    - DanielBMarkham 10y ago
      I find this a very difficult argument to accept, but I appreciate your sharing it. I believe you are conflating "having a political desire" with "...an implication here that there is some form of organized political desire that you are acting to further.." If a man loved Nazis in 1938 and blew himself up in Times Square? Not terrorism. There's no use of stealth in a pre-meditated way to instill fear to enact some political change. It's just some Nazi schmuck blowing himself up. Apologies if I'm responding to what I think you are saying instead of what you are, but fuck me. There's a huge difference in talking about what people feel and what they do, right? I feel a bunch of damned fool things, Never thought that this was some sort of topic for political debate.
      - throwaway729 10y ago
        No, I agree this is a topic upon which reasonable people can disagree. And I agree with your example. The problem is that a bunch of disparate unorganized attacks can have the same effect as a coordinated intentional terror campaign. At that point, you have to decide whether terror is defined by intent or effect. One Nazi in times square? OK, not terror. A dozen Nazis all across America, even if uncoordinated? Terror. I default to intent but am also liberal in allowing effect to stand in for intent.
  - hyperpape 10y ago
    Jim Crow was organized. When White Supremacy was the law of the land, and the police wouldn't prosecute the killing of a black man, that's organization.
  - OraclesDyn388 10y ago
    There's a documented history of "just bigots" sitting around fuming, listening to a politician or local clergy disparage minorities, leading to violence against them. There's a history of government, for political reasons, peddling that message to those very people. Watch Nixon's re-election ads. Our own government is complicit in pushing these ideas. More so in the past, but the connection cannot be overlooked as to how these ideas have been peddled and then passed along, not at all dissimilar to how Islamic extremists are fed nonsense. In many cases "just bigots" believed and planned to do things they thought were in the interests of their state, based upon misinformation peddled by the authoritarian structure they live under. You're re-writing history.
jessaustin 10y ago
Remember von Clausewitz; war in general is also politics. Also, terrorism as you're defining it has always existed. The difference is that now the USA military-industrial complex and its servants in media and politics have decided to base most of their marketing on the "threat" of terrorism. Bathed as we are in a boiling soup of constant media manipulation, we can't trust our gut reactions to anything that the MIC care about, especially terrorism. As a bias check, consider all the many causes of death that have caused and do cause far more deaths than terrorism.
justin66 10y ago
> The reason why is that terrorism is a form of politics. If you think the uptick in anti-immigrant, and more largely anti-minority, discrimination and violence has nothing to do with our politics I'm afraid I've got some bad news for you...
- battlebot 10y ago
  Don't lay this at the feet of regular American citizens who want to put an end to illegal immigration. It was Obama's shitty policies that led to this deluge of uncontrolled immigration and illicit behavior by HIS justice department. That the Trump Administration wants to enforce the laws is not the problem. We can't control every drunk redneck idiot that wants to hurt people.
simonh 10y ago
I agree 'war on terror' is idiotic. Terrorism is a law and order issue. It's an illegal act. Yes sometimes the perpetrators have state sponsors, but that doesn't really change anything about the nature of the crime, though it does actually open up additional means to fight it by applying military, economic or political pressure on that state. In the case of e.g. Iran they've basically been brought to the negotiating table by economic and political pressure. They're still far from clean, but at least they're tractable. IS on the other hand is functionally a state but politically and economically intractable. We and several Middle Eastern nations are at war with them. However their terrorist activities carried out outside their territory are still criminal activities best dealt with as law and order issues. Terrorist acts are crimes. Very rarely does the definition of a crime include specific criteria on the nature of the perpetrator. In other words the crime committed only changes based on who committed it in pretty specific ways. For example there's a crime and there's conspiracy to commit the crime. Unless the definition of terrorism explicitly defines it as a crime committed by groups, I see no reason to exclude acts committed by individuals acting alone.

throwaway729 10y ago

Fair enough. Maybe calculated or coordinated is better than stealth. Which would perhaps exclude this attack (maybe, maybe not) but include e.g. organized and intentional white nationalists.

DanielBMarkham 10y ago
There's an implication here that there is some form of organized political desire that you are acting to further -- and that you are deliberately planning to further that effort. The KKK were terrorists. White bigots in the south were not. They were just bigots. Every stupid, angry, bigoted and violent person is not a terrorist. To me an almost classic example is that couple out in California that shot up those folks. They had planned for weeks, bought gear, posted online. They were even shooting video in order to publish of the attacks as they occurred. That's terrorism.
- throwaway729 10y ago
  > There's an implication here that there is some form of organized political desire that you are acting to further -- and that you are deliberately planning to further that effort. In that case, I would argue that this attack fits your definition of terrorism. The political ideology is white nationalism clothed in Islamophobic garb. The immediate political desire is, in the attacker's own words, "get out of my country!" It's hard to argue that killing someone (and by extension making people like them fear for their safety) is not a deliberate and planned way of getting "them" -- both the individual and the group that individual supposedly represents -- out of your country.
  - DanielBMarkham 10y ago
    I find this a very difficult argument to accept, but I appreciate your sharing it. I believe you are conflating "having a political desire" with "...an implication here that there is some form of organized political desire that you are acting to further.." If a man loved Nazis in 1938 and blew himself up in Times Square? Not terrorism. There's no use of stealth in a pre-meditated way to instill fear to enact some political change. It's just some Nazi schmuck blowing himself up. Apologies if I'm responding to what I think you are saying instead of what you are, but fuck me. There's a huge difference in talking about what people feel and what they do, right? I feel a bunch of damned fool things, Never thought that this was some sort of topic for political debate.
    - throwaway729 10y ago
      No, I agree this is a topic upon which reasonable people can disagree. And I agree with your example. The problem is that a bunch of disparate unorganized attacks can have the same effect as a coordinated intentional terror campaign. At that point, you have to decide whether terror is defined by intent or effect. One Nazi in times square? OK, not terror. A dozen Nazis all across America, even if uncoordinated? Terror. I default to intent but am also liberal in allowing effect to stand in for intent.
- hyperpape 10y ago
  Jim Crow was organized. When White Supremacy was the law of the land, and the police wouldn't prosecute the killing of a black man, that's organization.
- OraclesDyn388 10y ago
  There's a documented history of "just bigots" sitting around fuming, listening to a politician or local clergy disparage minorities, leading to violence against them. There's a history of government, for political reasons, peddling that message to those very people. Watch Nixon's re-election ads. Our own government is complicit in pushing these ideas. More so in the past, but the connection cannot be overlooked as to how these ideas have been peddled and then passed along, not at all dissimilar to how Islamic extremists are fed nonsense. In many cases "just bigots" believed and planned to do things they thought were in the interests of their state, based upon misinformation peddled by the authoritarian structure they live under. You're re-writing history.

jessaustin 10y ago

Remember von Clausewitz; war in general is also politics. Also, terrorism as you're defining it has always existed. The difference is that now the USA military-industrial complex and its servants in media and politics have decided to base most of their marketing on the "threat" of terrorism. Bathed as we are in a boiling soup of constant media manipulation, we can't trust our gut reactions to anything that the MIC care about, especially terrorism. As a bias check, consider all the many causes of death that have caused and do cause far more deaths than terrorism.

justin66 10y ago

> The reason why is that terrorism is a form of politics. If you think the uptick in anti-immigrant, and more largely anti-minority, discrimination and violence has nothing to do with our politics I'm afraid I've got some bad news for you...

battlebot 10y ago
Don't lay this at the feet of regular American citizens who want to put an end to illegal immigration. It was Obama's shitty policies that led to this deluge of uncontrolled immigration and illicit behavior by HIS justice department. That the Trump Administration wants to enforce the laws is not the problem. We can't control every drunk redneck idiot that wants to hurt people.

simonh 10y ago

I agree 'war on terror' is idiotic. Terrorism is a law and order issue. It's an illegal act. Yes sometimes the perpetrators have state sponsors, but that doesn't really change anything about the nature of the crime, though it does actually open up additional means to fight it by applying military, economic or political pressure on that state. In the case of e.g. Iran they've basically been brought to the negotiating table by economic and political pressure. They're still far from clean, but at least they're tractable. IS on the other hand is functionally a state but politically and economically intractable. We and several Middle Eastern nations are at war with them. However their terrorist activities carried out outside their territory are still criminal activities best dealt with as law and order issues. Terrorist acts are crimes. Very rarely does the definition of a crime include specific criteria on the nature of the perpetrator. In other words the crime committed only changes based on who committed it in pretty specific ways. For example there's a crime and there's conspiracy to commit the crime. Unless the definition of terrorism explicitly defines it as a crime committed by groups, I see no reason to exclude acts committed by individuals acting alone.