[crazedmongoose2003]

http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/anything-y...n-the-mar.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/s...st/8137021.stm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/ju...-threat-police


I remembered once Icer said something along the lines of "you can tell it wasn't a liberal protest because there wasn't damaged property anywhere'.

When I read that post I basically was suddenly engulfed in anger and I didn't quite even realize why back then.


Oh yeah, now I do.

As far as the western world is concerned for the last 50 years, domestic terrorists have ALWAYS been more extreme and dangerous on the right.

I mean on the left yes you have Bill Ayers trying to blow up buildings whilst making sure nobody was in them, and students in 1968 being general not very orderly (though in my opinion in the case of 1968 they had good reason to be).

On the right? What do we have?

Abortion clinic bombers
Church goer shooters (just last year the guy who shot up a church was revealed to have his house full of right wing literature by Coulter, Limbaugh and the likes)
Freedom riders being beaten and even lynched (whilst the rest of the country did nothing and local authorities even allowed the KKK to attack freedom riders)
Nail bombs against gay, muslim and black communities
The unibomber
Oklahoma
Recent minutemen home invasion against suspected latino drug dealer, shot him, his wife, his 9 year old daughter and made off with a fritload of cash


And the list goes on


So I don't know where did we ever get the image that far leftists were more violent, because last I heard they weren't blowing up women, children and church goers. Nor were they constantly planning armed violent revolutions. Even the Bush administration admitted that right wing terrorists were a far more credible threat to US security.




Anyway, sorry for that partisan rant but it's just been bugging me for ages. Now we can go back to actually discussing the topic.

[coolmule]

Seems pretty retarded to attack a charity, hardly seems to be a move likely to rally people around a union flag.

[Tyndmyr]

Feh, partisan "we're better because of X" is generally filled with FUD.

Both libs and conservs have been involved in plenty of protests, plenty of which have turned violent. Depending, of course, on how you draw the lines of violence or your faction, you can always turn up some result that makes you look "less bad".

It's generally a pretty futile endevour, though.

[Farseer_Emlyn]

I mean on the left yes you have Bill Ayers trying to blow up buildings whilst making sure nobody was in them, and students in 1968 being general not very orderly (though in my opinion in the case of 1968 they had good reason to be).

And ALF
And ELF
And BLA
And other eco terrorists like tree spiking, fire bombing developments, and vandalizing automobiles.

:

You need to make a distinction between organized terrorism and lone wolf terrorism. The Right tends to have a lot of inflammatory rhetoric that can inspire individuals to act in extreme ways. The Left tends to organize grass roots movements which act in extreme ways.

[Nox]

Originally Posted by Crazedmongoose

As far as the western world is concerned for the last 50 years, domestic terrorists have ALWAYS been more extreme and dangerous on the right.

I mean on the left yes you have Bill Ayers trying to blow up buildings whilst making sure nobody was in them, and students in 1968 being general not very orderly (though in my opinion in the case of 1968 they had good reason to be).

:
That would be true if you ignore the dozens of far-left groups like FARC and ELN, for example, that are responsible for thousands of murders, kidnappings, torture, drug running, and more. To further illustrate the point FARC alone is responsible for over 3,290 documented cases of terrorism from 77 to 97.

[crazedmongoose2003]

Originally Posted by Nox

:
That would be true if you ignore the dozens of far-left groups like FARC and ELN, for example, that are responsible for thousands of murders, kidnappings, torture, drug running, and more. To further illustrate the point FARC alone is responsible for over 3,290 documented cases of terrorism from 77 to 97.

That's a pretty pointless argument, since I said the western world.

And right wing terror groups in Latin America were just as bad if not worse, such as the Contras in Nicaragua. And they were being directly supported by Reagan too.

[enderwiggin]

Originally Posted by Crazedmongoose

That's a pretty pointless argument, since I said the western world.

And right wing terror groups in Latin America were just as bad if not worse, such as the Contras in Nicaragua. And they were being directly supported by Reagan too.

If we're going to look at it like that then your opening three links/examples are to be dismissed since it doesn't affect us "Western Worlders" :.

I also will say that describing the West like that is offensive. It makes the whole of us Western posters look completely apathetic when there's other sides to the story. What makes you think that you can label what we consider relevant just because it strengthens a biased outlook for your argument?

Me? I don't gerrymander terrorist incidents. I take an especially strong look at events in Central and Southern America because I used to live there. In fact, as a child , my family was forced to leave our house because of a firefight going on!

I'm not saying I disagree with you on this topic, but you are clearly presenting/restricting the evidence with a biased slant.

[compubrains]

Wait what exactly is this thread about? It seems kinda inflammatory to me. Don't get me wrong, as a libertarian it would bring me great joy for you guys to tear each other to shreds, but I don't get it. People are crazy. They do things based on their beliefs. Some people are liberal, and some are conservative. Therefore, some crazy liberals do something crazy in the name of liberalism, and some crazy conservatives do something crazy in the name of conservatism. It has nothing to do with the beliefs themselves, but rather the people. They're crazy. The belief is just the vessel of their craziness.

[Sidstyler]

So really the only thing you can take from this thread:

Terrorism is bad. There are all kinds of terrorists from all walks of life.

[crazedmongoose2003]

Originally Posted by enderwiggin

If we're going to look at it like that then your opening three links/examples are to be dismissed since it doesn't affect us "Western Worlders" :.

I also will say that describing the West like that is offensive. It makes the whole of us Western posters look completely apathetic when there's other sides to the story. What makes you think that you can label what we consider relevant just because it strengthens a biased outlook for your argument?

Me? I don't gerrymander terrorist incidents. I take an especially strong look at events in Central and Southern America because I used to live there. In fact, as a child , my family was forced to leave our house because of a firefight going on!

I'm not saying I disagree with you on this topic, but you are clearly presenting/restricting the evidence with a biased slant.

UK isn't part of the western world now?




Also in response to Emlyn.

Eco-terrorists are grossly irresponsible and to be condemned, ALF, ELF, Sea Shepherds etc. endanger lives and destroys property.


But there's one prominent point which makes them different from their right wing counter parts such as the KKK, the Aryan Brotherhood, and lone mass murderers like the Oklahoma bomber.

They DO NOT INTENTIONALLY KILL PEOPLE.

In fact I know at least ELF and Sea Shepherds have NEVER killed anybody. Not sure about ALF.

Originally Posted by CompuBrains

Wait what exactly is this thread about? It seems kinda inflammatory to me. Don't get me wrong, as a libertarian it would bring me great joy for you guys to tear each other to shreds, but I don't get it. People are crazy. They do things based on their beliefs. Some people are liberal, and some are conservative. Therefore, some crazy liberals do something crazy in the name of liberalism, and some crazy conservatives do something crazy in the name of conservatism. It has nothing to do with the beliefs themselves, but rather the people. They're crazy. The belief is just the vessel of their craziness.

The point is comparing leftist driven domestic terrorism and rightist driven domestic terrorism in the Western World is like comparing the human rights abuses of America and Saudi Arabia. Yet we never seem to make that distinction aside from the actual intelligence agencies who know what they're doing.

I also will say that describing the West like that is offensive. It makes the whole of us Western posters look completely apathetic when there's other sides to the story. What makes you think that you can label what we consider relevant just because it strengthens a biased outlook for your argument?

Me? I don't gerrymander terrorist incidents. I take an especially strong look at events in Central and Southern America because I used to live there. In fact, as a child , my family was forced to leave our house because of a firefight going on!

I'm not saying I disagree with you on this topic, but you are clearly presenting/restricting the evidence with a biased slant.

Well we're talking about localized domestic security? Obviously around the world there's violent groups of both stripes and they both kill an awful lot of people.

Originally Posted by Sidstyler

So really the only thing you can take from this thread:

Terrorism is bad. There are all kinds of terrorists from all walks of life.

It's this kind of view that lead to the US spending half of the 50's and 60's hunting down student protesters and workers unions and film makers whilst the KKK was at large and actively lynching beating ethnic minorities in the heartland.

There's degrees of terrorism. Sea Shepherds, ELF, ALF, Weatherman, Liberia Liberation Army and other leftist violent groups do not intentionally kill people and have very rarely (in most cases never) been involved in the deaths of people. Their crime is property destruction and in certain cases the endangerment of people.

KKK, Oklahoma Bomber, London Nailbomber, Unibomber, other white supremacist groups etc. on the other hand actively kill people. In fact they're the original definition of terrorists. They kill civilians in order to inspire terror. Whilst groups like the ELF and ALF specifically try to avoid killing civilians, and their activities are more akin to partisan fighters.


If you see a difference between the French Resistance and Al Qaeda you should see a difference between these two categories.




edit: for the record I do believe on average your leftist protest is more confrontational and threatening than your rightist protest. As in "oh man they sounded really angry and some of them were wearing masks". But in terms of credible threats of terrorism there's no comparison.