Mattyfisk wrote on Apr 15^th, 2011 at 4:22pm:


Someone posted a similar sounding set of criteria for Islamic extremism a while back. It reminded me of someone here.

abu_rashid wrote on Apr 16^th, 2011 at 12:39pm:


Western governments don't write dictionaries Abu.

Credibility, is a truly beautiful word, imo.



Dictionary;
credible = = able to be believed; convincing.

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Communication. It helps in the conveyance of ideas if words have actual and stable meanings. Hence, people resist the temptation to redefine terrorism to include conventional warfare.

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No their isn't. The use of the word terrorism is not intended to deny the reality of conventional warfare, nor does it achieve this in practice. Your stance on this issue seems to me as silly as complaining that the word rape does not include murder in it's meaning and must therefor have been concocted by murderers to hide their acts. No-one is denying the reality of the two wars we are currently engaged in and there is robust public debate on both of them. Your focus on the semantics kind of trivialises both terrorism and conventional war.

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It sounds like a novice's attempt at propaganda. We get the same tripe from western hippies who are obviously upset at the skill with which the American government has used the word terrorism. They seem to think that all that is required to outmanouvre the US government on this front is to redefine terrorism. You might as well try to win people over by calling Osama a freedom fighter.

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There is no bandwagon Abu. Words have meaning. It's as simple as that.

Some interesting notes on the difficulty of agreeing on a definition:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism#Definition

While pinning it down exactly is not easy, there is general agreement on what the term does not cover:

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Another common theme is the focus on maximising psychological impact. In contrast. in conventional war the strategy is usually to confine the psychological impact to the active theatre of war.

fd,

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So in summary...

Western governments supposedly don't write dictionaries (this may be true), but it's irrelevant, since dictionary definitions aren't always agreed upon, instead let us look to how a Western government think tank defines it instead and run with that.

Do you even know what you're writing here fd?

Cos it really doesn't seem like it.

freediver wrote on Apr 18^th, 2011 at 6:54pm:


So the Shock And Awe campaign was terrorism...as  its focus was to maximise the psychological impact on Saddam and the Iraqi people. The US military at the time admitted this was so, when asked by the media about the goals of Shock and Awe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shock_and_awe

"attempting "to affect the will, perception, and understanding of the adversary to fit or respond to our strategic policy ends through imposing a regime of Shock and Awe"

Therefore. the US govenment are terrorists.

And S11 was not a terrorist attatck, as we have been told time and time again that Osama Bin Laden had declared war on the US, shortly before the attacks. Given that you've already stated that war cannot be terrorism, then S11 was not a terrorist attack.

Gee...thanks for clearing that up FD.  

Walter Laqueur should be honest...according to the US and mindless drones such as yourself, terrorism has nothing to do with the act, and more to do with the perpertrator.

Hence, when Israeli snipers shoot Palestinian children in the head whilst sitting in class, this is war, and not terrorism.

Yet when Hamas defend their people and homes against the very same Israeli's that terrorise and kill thier people, and families....thats terrorism.

Israel dropping hundreds of bombs killing thousands in Lebenon And Gaza - the majority of these in civilian areas - this is war.

Hamas/Hezbollah firing hundreds of rockets at Israel, also at civilian areas, during the same conflict, killing only a handful....thats terrorism.

Only a blind person wouldn't notice they double standards and hypocricy (blinded by ignorance and bigotry more often then not...sound familiar FD?)

And you wonder why we muslims don't take you and your opinions seriously.

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No you got it backwards. The US went to some length to contain the psychological impact and reassure people around the world that the war is against terrorists, not Islam. They did not bomb Bagdad and say to the rest of the middle east 'watch out buggerers we are coming after you next'. While terrorism is defined by the use of terrorism, it does not mean that anything that scares people is terrorism.

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Anyone can declare a war. That does not make them a recognised nation state. Abu for example (the chief proponent of the 'America is a terrorist state BS) has gone to great lengths to argue that we were not justified in invading Afghanistan to get him and should have gotten permission from every tribal warlord between the coast and the caves before passing through on our way.

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Again, you oversimplify the definition then claim it's breadth to be the essence of the definition. I said that 'conventional war' is not terrorism.

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That is partly true. That is what the word means. I still can't figure out why you people get upset that you can't redefine it so as to equate GWB with Osama. It's like you have swallowed all the US propaganda about terrorism hook line and sinker and now you can't figure out how to complain about US foreign policy other than to insist they are terrorists. If GWB had declared war on hippies you lot would try to redefine hippy so GWB was one, rather than pointing out the absurdity of declaring war on hippies. Your infantile attempts to beat them at the PR game merely play into their campaign.

So Bush is not a terrorist?