Media Sensationalism and Terrorism

[tantric]

to me, the way to fight terrorism is to not be afraid. terrorism just isn't a significant danger - you are more likely to die by any number of weird events than in a terrorist attack. moreover, 3000 people died in 9/11. that many children die from malaria every day. just taking the painting from those towers and selling them would have provided enough money to save many thousands of lives.

i think terrorism exploits a weakness in our society and that we need to deal with that. at least address it. are suicide bombers inspired by religion or a desire to be famous? an attack kills a few dozen people and the proper response is using millions of dollars worth of military crap to flatten some other part of the world? what about building a hospital or creating scholarships for syrian girls? now, i'm not saying this will deal with rogue governments, but instead as a response to terrorism. just pay it minimal attention. don't look.

 

[another1]

Right, I mean.. the color red is the most eye catching. Fear is awesome motivation. A little blood in your movie, news and cereal... bam you're in the shower getting ready for work. I was wondering why there hasn't been an actual terror act on U.S soil for so long. The "threat" is always there, but *looks around* hmm where are the explosions and mayhem promised? I'm not complaining. I'm glad my government makes secret deals with even crazier people. Like, the real terrorists are the people who are scared. Feel me? People spread fear through invisible fields. The probability of dying any given day is so high if you think about it. How are we able to zip through traffic, run down stairs and all that without totally dying every time? Think of how fragile the skull actually is. You could die or go crazy from what you consume way more easily than whatever masked idiots can do to you. THat stuff irritates me, too. The shit is rigged to a certain extent because being afraid makes you vulnerable to the real chicanery happening round here. Right?

 

[faded_Glory]

People are rightfully shocked and angered when someone blows up innocent people (except of course when it happens in Farawaygistan). These understandable feelings are then exploited by the mass media for profit and by politicians for power. The entire terrorism issue is blown out of all proportions as if it is the existential threat of our time - which it is not, not by a long stretch. Draconic, poorly thought out and utterly impractical counter measures are being proposed that would disrupt and change our lives, our culture and our values forever if implemented. Emotions are being whipped up that will do far more damage and cause far more suffering than the totality of terrorist attacks ever had or will.

The way to tackle violent extremism is to strengthen the moderate center, i.e. all the people who are happy and willing to co-exist peacefully with everybody else who live by the rules of civilised society. Which in fact is the huge majority of people all over the world. We need to calm down, work together and firmly say NO to extremism, whether from the Islamic side or from the reactionary far-right. Marginalise it, not feed it by angered frenzy. Extremism can be beaten, but not by fuelling it with more and more hatred. I am convinced we can do this - we, that is all of us. Stay calm and carry on!

 

[DrZoidberg]

to me, the way to fight terrorism is to not be afraid. terrorism just isn't a significant danger - you are more likely to die by any number of weird events than in a terrorist attack. moreover, 3000 people died in 9/11. that many children die from malaria every day. just taking the painting from those towers and selling them would have provided enough money to save many thousands of lives.

i think terrorism exploits a weakness in our society and that we need to deal with that. at least address it. are suicide bombers inspired by religion or a desire to be famous? an attack kills a few dozen people and the proper response is using millions of dollars worth of military crap to flatten some other part of the world? what about building a hospital or creating scholarships for syrian girls? now, i'm not saying this will deal with rogue governments, but instead as a response to terrorism. just pay it minimal attention. don't look.

And if we ignore the terrorists, they have lost.

 

[repoman]

If we ignore arsonists they have lost.

 

[DrZoidberg]

If we ignore arsonists they have lost.

No, they haven't. The goal of an arsonist is to watch things burn. If we ignore them more things will burn. Terrorists use terror in order to create political change. If we just treat terrorists exactly as we would an arsonist, and only focus on the actual damage, and completely ignore why they're doing it, they lose. The object is to create terror. If we refuse to be terrified they have no reason to continue. If terrorists make us terrified more things will explode.

 

[faded_Glory]

We should downplay the symptoms of extremism, the actual attacks, but I don't think it is wise to ignore the root causes. There are real problems and issues that fuel extremism and there surely are sensible approaches to tackle these. Most are long term issues though, and there won't be quick solutions. Working with the Islamic world instead of against them would be really helpful in the long term.

 

[tantric]

the major root cause of terrorism is american foreign policy. if we linked trade to human rights, stopped supporting murderous regimes with oil, etc, that would go a LONG way to ending the problem. there is nothing admirable about how the USA relates to the rest of the world - it's purely mercantile. this MUST change. we need to be the good guys again.

frankly, engage iran and ditch the saudis. for a start.

 

[JonA]

The problem is calling people terrorists who are actually holy-war soldiers in Allah's army - so they believe.

It's important to understand this difference, because terrorism exists to terrorize - create fear - but much of what is called Islamic terrorism exists to promote a specific religious viewpoint and force that viewpoint on everyone else.

It does not matter if the world goes quietly or loudly, folks on such a mission won't stop until they have submitted everyone to their system of theocratic rule or until someone stops them.

Not acknowledging it won't make the problem go away and may actually make it worse.

 

[faded_Glory]

I don't think this makes sense. Terrorists always have a deeper motive than simply create fear (unless they are rare lone psychopaths). They think that indiscriminate bombings will somehow achieve an objective, their objective. In the case of Islamic extremists that may indeed be to impose world wide Sharia (although it is actually quite hard to envisage a realistic route that starts with bombings and ends with worldwide Sharia). Other terrorists use bombings for different purposes: Breivik and the Oklahoma bombers for instance had political aims. Very few, if any, do these things just 'to create fear'.

Clearly terrorists must be stopped before they can commit their terror acts, I don't think anybody would disagree with that. I see the debate more about the effectiveness of various approaches to stop terrorism. Some people promote crude, blanket wide measures that don't differentiate between actual terrorists and people that are somehow being associated with them (without bothering to provide concrete evidence that they actually are). Trump, anyone? Others, like myself, think that such an approach actually makes matters worse because it negatively impacts far more innocent people than actual terrorists, undermines our own values, and creates a breeding ground for new terrorists because of its inescapable injustice.

If the root cause for Islamic extremism is a particular concept of what Islam teaches, a successful approach would be to try and suppress such teachings and promote different concepts of what Islam teaches. There are many Islamic clerics and scholars who offer peaceful alternatives, and such people need to be engaged and supported as much as possible. Only Islam itself can successfully overcome Islamic extremism. Pressuring Islam from the outside will simply have the opposite effect than intended: people will naturally close ranks to defend their faith, and become radicalised in the process. Such a cure will be deadlier than the disease. Creating an atmosphere where the West is seen to respect and positively engage with peaceful Muslim societies is in the long term bound to be a far more effective way to root out terrorism than pushing all Muslims into the arms of the extremists by spitting onto their faith and treating them like second-class citizens of the world.

 

[DrZoidberg]

delete

 

[Valjean]

The root cause of Islamic extremism is American empire building. Remove the cause and you remove the effect. Attack the effect and you just generate more terrorists.
Every American intervention in the Middle East has come back to bite us in the ass ten or fifteen years later.

Are we really so obtuse as not to see this, or is this 1ly a market for the military-industrial complex, a military training ground and a domestic populace control tactic?

 

[another1]

Terrorism is in everything and U.S policy doesn't have much to do with it. A suicidal poor person who happens to be brainwashed and virgin lusty will find any reason to do something shady. That is way oversimplified but terror in one form or another makes the world go round. Virgins do too, but especially terror. I agree with the surface of your post but I think terrorizers will always be terrorizing. They like it.

Your almost sympathetic stance is supposed to blame U.S foreign policy yet you suggested "engaging" more poor people who will eventually blow something up because of the wrong that will inevitably be found in anything the U.S does. I really don't know and you may be right. Who knows, but the cause this particular terrorism existed long before the U.S was around and that should be obvious.