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 Off-Topic / Debate / 10146
10145  |  10147
Subject: 
Re: A question of remembrance...
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.off-topic.debate
Date: 
Wed, 2 May 2001 11:39:48 GMT
Viewed: 
769 times
  
In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Richard Marchetti writes:
Larry Pieniazek writes:
But what if the fault is almost all on one side? (it's not 60-40 in this
case but it's not 99-1 either, so this is a hypothetical, I want to know
what you think) What then?

Well, this is a very hard question to answer in the hypothetical without
more specifics, so I leave it to you to pose a more detailed hypothetical
should you choose to do so.

How about when one side is a nation that says it wants to exterminate a
certain religion's adherents and the other side is an almost weaponless
group of members of that religion in the inner city of an occupied capital
of a country that nation invaded?

Larry, could you define what you mean by a terrorist?

Good question. I would tend to say it's a person or group using violence
against bystanders as a way to make a political point or get a political
outcome. A kidnapper, for example, is not usually a terrorist, he just wants
a ransom, (although there ARE terrorist hostage takings, admittedly) nor is
a deranged shooter.

Answering your examples...

Do you mean like Timothy McVey,

Clearly yes, Timothy McVeigh is a terrorist. (and since he says he wants to
die publicly, we had ought to not give him what he wants and keep him alive
and in prison with no publicity until he changes his mind and wants to live,
at which point...)

the dozens of people at the Wacco compound,

No, I would call the instigators of violence in that situation (the BATF)
more along the lines of government forces out of control rather than
terrorists. They had no explicit political goal other than self aggrandizement.

or rioters in the
streets of Los Angeles after the civil trial of the police who beat Rodney >King?

Rioters? I don't think so (but I haven't dug in hard on the circumstances,
this is a snap characterization). Looters? almost certainly not, they were
using the unrest as an excuse to steal from innocent third parties.

Some people claim political grounds for their actions but can be thought of
as little more than common criminals.

Yes.

When their numbers are significant
enough, their individual crimes may coalesce into a kind of civil
insurrection - a movement of a sort with real grievances they would like
redressed.  Where and how do you draw the line between each group?

Good question. I don't know.

++Lar



Message has 2 Replies:
  Re: A question of remembrance...
 
(...) Nonsense. Terrorism can are be perpitrated against a state. Groups such as the IRA worked that killing "bystanders" is bad PR. So they attack the state : Police, Army, & the Post Office(!). Recently the IRA have taken to apologising when (...) (23 years ago, 2-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
  Re: A question of remembrance...
 
(...) I thought this was supposed to be hypothetical, not rhetorical... =oP Plus I plead the 5th, or maybe the 9th -- whatever gets me out of the trouble of having to answer this one... (...) Did he really write this? Was this the motivation behind (...) (23 years ago, 2-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)

Message is in Reply To:
  Re: A question of remembrance...
 
(...) Well, this is a very hard question to answer in the hypothetical without more specifics, so I leave it to you to pose a more detailed hypothetical should you choose to do so. Given the real world instance of the nations of Israel and (...) (23 years ago, 2-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)

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