Terrorists

[SarCaustic]

A previous question:
(http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/News/Question208835.html)
in which people refused to accept attacks during wars on civilians as terrorism led me to ask these questions.
What is a terrorist? Which acts define terrorism? Name the biggest terrorists of today and their crimes

[noxlumos]

Well the word is usually interchangeable with "freedom fighter", "patriot", "insurgent" and "murderer" depending on to whom you speak about the same acts. It's all a case of social perception. Likewise "armed conflict", "war", "civil war","civil disobedience" and "riot" can be manipulated in similar ways. I don't think the question can be answered in any form but from a purely personal point of view, as we saw with the previous question, when some people thought Hiroshima was a not an act of terrorism and some people did. I think it also depends on how much of the bigger picture your trying to appraise at the time as well.

For me a loose definition would be, the targetting of civilians with no gain other than to promote a feeling of fear and terror amongst the community in order for the community to bring pressure to bear upon other quarters, to enable a political advantage to be gained by the perpetrators.

[WaldoMcFroog]

The dictionary defintion of a terrorism is: 'The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.'

Therefore, terrorism is a tactic that can potentially be employed by anyone. The difficulty is in the interpretation. Some (for instance, Noam Chomsky) take the view that one has to view an act dispassionately. For example, if one decides that assassinating a senior politicial is unacceptable when one side does it, to ensure a meaningful debate, it must therefore follow it is is ascribed equal moral acceptablility/ repugnace regardless of who carries it out.

However, it is clear that this doesn't happen in reality, and therefore any debate must be regarded as suspect.

[WaldoMcFroog]

Interesting debate on this issue here:

http://www.counterpunch.org/chomsky0530.html

Acutally ends up turning into an AB-style debate too...

[SarCaustic]

Thanks for the link!

[jump79]

Terrorism is equivalent to ' political violence' and usually involves "targeting of civilians," or is executed "with disregard for human life."
A terrorist is someone who commits or commands these acts, taking the law into their own hands.

As I said earlier in another thread, how can some countries who may be on the receiving end of terrorism but then act in exactly the same way be any different than their opponents, the 'terrorists'?
The USA had the appaling 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, which resulted in it delcaring a global war on terror. This was widely supported to begin with, but with time, USA has turned into something of a bully, and pretty much does what it likes. The Iraq war is a good example of this, and despite vehement worldwide opposition it went ahead anyway, using the fabricated threat of WMD's as an excuse.
The war was terribly planned and executed and the result is the civil war that may soon/ or has already?? broken out in Iraq. More people have died after the war than in it, which is proof enough of what a huge mistake this whole thing has been from the start.