This Just In: Rolling UK News Thread

Oh great. So, that's every street preacher on every town/city centre becoming the new attack-point, as opposed to being ignored and walked past, right?

Some worried men:
http://www.addictmusic.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/manic-street-preachers.jpg

what, that working your 9-5 and eating your vegetables won't blow anything up? i reckon so yeah.

xpost

https://si0.twimg.com/profile_images/129730596/2630509441_944a6ee3e2_m.jpg

"One of the best ways to defeat terrorism is to go about our normal lives"

What if your normal life is being a terrorist
Makes you think

what if your normal life is defeating terrorism?

I thought that was Ira Glass, but the glasses are different.

Best way of defeating terrorism is probably like arresting terrorists or something? As I was leading my normal life and having a bath last night it seemed like the right thing to do, but on the other hand somehow not enough?

When they do that ilx goes wild too

tbh i am just posting this one bcz look at these assholes:

http://pbs.twimg.com/media/BK8jIe8CUAAARAk.jpg

Nice that Luton Town fans have got something to do during the off-season now though

What's a ballies?

balaclava

ski mask

RIP Salman Rushdi

http://www.sophistimom.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/baklava1.jpg

Bally nuances

When they do that ilx goes wild too

come off it would you, it's obv a dumb soundbyte, and nobody is "going wild".

it's a bally disgrace

even darragh's "lol you pathetic liberals support terrorism" trolling feels half-hearted and rote today

Its a minimalist approach you ass

one thing i've been wondering about is whether gruesome political violence is more objectionable than covert 'civilized' violence (like dropping drones on weddings). it was mostly regarding that syrian rebel who ate the pro-assad soldier's lung (thinking it was his heart) and taped it, but also relevant to this event. these things seem shocking + (apologies for the loaded word in advance) 'barbaric,' but maybe it's no worse than any act of violence. maybe machete'ing a soldier just makes explicit the horror inherent in every act of violence and its just my squeamishness that makes me think it's anything worse.

Yeah, that might be why they call it 'terror'... (and why it's a bad word and stuff)

if we're going to draw up a moral scale from acts of calculated murder - i don't know if that has value or not

in a pragmatic sense i am more concerned by state violence i think, to the extent that it reinforces hegemonic power, to the extent that a broader range of options ought to be open to the state in most circumstances, to the extent that it frequently appears to be counterproductive to maintaining the peace and security of citizens, to the extent that it muddies and undermines civil rights in a way that random acts of murder by individuals - however horrific - can't do. because we accept on the whole that the private resort to violence is (emotionally? intellectually?) intolerable but we often tolerate the violence of the state, through propaganda, through distance, through dishonesty

I think public mutilation with edged weapons is always going to grab the headlines above unmanned robot planes (here, at least - I'm sure there's a lot of cultural difference to take into account too) and I think these men understood that with limited resources such brutality was their best chance of making an impact.

State violence vs private violence

i don't really distinguish the Woolwich killing from any other act of murder. i believe murder is bad, but i don't believe it's very possible to police the hearts and minds of individuals who decide to commit murder. at best you can decide on the most effective or appropriate way of punishing murder and hope that that has some deterrent effect.

"authentic" terrorist violence, or state violence, is usually carried out in the name of tactics. the range of options open to dealing with organizations or states engaged in political disputes is broader - not that i'd rule out violence as an option, but there are other options which may be more effective long term, in a much different way to the problem of random acts of violence committed by individuals

which is my main bone of contention when Cameron talks about "terrorism" here. he's using the root connection of terror and terrorist to conflate two different forms of violence, and by choosing the broader, unnuanced use of the word he's effectively using it as a dog-whistle for the same kind of bigot who used to think back in the 1980s that every citizen of Irish descent was a terrorist sympathizer

I'm not sure this is even terrorism.

Wish I had taken a picture, but I saw a TV this morning tuned to FOX News covering this, with the caption:

KNIVES, MACHETES & GUNS
TERRORIST: YOUR WOMEN AND CHILDREN ARE NEXT

On one hand, there’s a danger that calling it terrorism might elevate it, politically and culturally, above other forms of violence. On the other, applying the term to two idiots with machetes who are unlikely to have a coherent agenda or be part of an organised plot actually serves to deglamourise and demystify the "terrorist threat". Most people arrested for terrorist offenses actually are idiots, misfits, fantasists or people suffering from severe mental health issues. They aren’t globally-networked criminal masterminds.

Most people arrested for terrorist offenses actually are idiots

They certainly seem to be in the UK

I don't think it's not terrorism because I'm worried about elevating it politically about other forms of violence. The perpetrators already did that when they cited explicit political motivations for the act. I don't think it's terrorism because it wasn't an act of random violence committed against civilians but one that intentionally targeted an English soldier and specifically left civilians unharmed. In my opinion, terrorism is specifically indiscriminate violence against a civilian population.

so barracks bombings and the like don't count?

Yeah, we have a long history of using the term "terrorism" to apply to the targeting of military personnel in the UK.

Particularly off-duty personnel.

Police a popular target in NI, does that count?

I don't think so - police are domestic law enforcement. Soldiers are military targets.

I get that it could be seen as a geographically displaced version of the attacks on UK soldiers in Afghanistan etc - is that what you're getting at? An act of war?

Yes.

This piece asks some of the same questions re the use of the word terrorism. It's a really difficult word to define without incriminating your own state.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/23/woolwich-attack-terrorism-blowback

xp

i think that's a push when the soldier is off-duty and the killers are unlikely to belong to an organization with strategic goals

and there's a problem with that in that it possibly ennobles them in certain quarters even more than calling them terrorists.

I'm not that worried about ennobling them. Anyone who approves of hacking UK soldiers a part w/ machetes in the public does not care what we call the act.

The US, the UK and its allies have repeatedly killed Muslim civilians over the past decade (and before that), but defenders of those governments insist that this cannot be "terrorism" because it is combatants, not civilians, who are the targets. Can it really be the case that when western nations continuously kill Muslim civilians, that's not "terrorism", but when Muslims kill western soldiers, that is terrorism?

Hate to say it but Glenn is right. This is not terrorism.

i'd argue that both cases are forms of terrorism. i don't see that the difference between war and terrorism is much more than semantic tho.

Was bin laden on or off duty

"(in fact, the US has re-defined "militant" to mean "any military-aged male in a strike zone")"

!!

Rushed journalism also produces The Guardian understands that both Adebolajo and the other suspect have featured in counter-terrorism investigations over the last eight years, the Guardian understands.

Though the article is also effective at painting the two suspects as the loose cannons you would expect, and has the refreshing sight of leader of the 'banned extremist group' they were hanging around saying "No, this was bang out of order" or words to that effect.

xpost more on that here

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/29/world/obamas-leadership-in-war-on-al-qaeda.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&pagewanted=all

Mr. Obama embraced a disputed method for counting civilian casualties that did little to box him in. It in effect counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants, according to several administration officials, unless there is explicit intelligence posthumously proving them innocent.

Counterterrorism officials insist this approach is one of simple logic: people in an area of known terrorist activity, or found with a top Qaeda operative, are probably up to no good.

Grr, that just reminds me of Tony Blair crowing about being tougher on Terror Suspects - motherfucker, you're a lawyer, you know what suspect means.