• Phoenixz@lemmy.ca
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      2 days ago

      I get what you’re saying but that definition of yours is lacking at best

      • Wren@lemmy.worldM
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        2 days ago

        Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims.”

        So… no, I think I got it right. I mean, its root is from the Latin word- “terror”. A threat of death is sure to cause such a feeling in most people. So- in this form, the threat illustrates the act of one person terrorizing another. Therefore- one who terrorizes is a terrorist by definition.

        This is not a stretch to arrive at this conclusion. That it sounds foreign might be a result of the normalization of violence.

        • grue@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          Your previous comment left out the “to achieve political or ideological aims” part, which is the essential difference between terrorism and regular violence.

          • Wren@lemmy.worldM
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            1 day ago

            “Ideological” pretty much covers everything else. A threat to kill is an act of terrorism.

            I think what’s happening here, is that murder has become so normalized that we have reached a point where the word “terrorism” has to have some special definition that excludes it from the regular run-of-the-mill terror one would experience when they’re life is threatened for whatever reason.

            I mean, would you feel terror if someone threatened your life in a way that you truly believed you were in danger?

            Oh, and she sung a song in Spanish, and was threatened with death for not singing in American English. That screams political to me…

            • grue@lemmy.world
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              15 hours ago

              “Ideological” pretty much covers everything else. A threat to kill is an act of terrorism.

              “Ideological” does not cover:

              • threatening to kill someone while robbing them
              • threatening to kill someone because you’re high off your gourd and hallucinating that they’re a space alien
              • threatening to kill someone because they fucked your wife
              • threatening to kill someone because they’re threatening you and you’re acting in retaliation or self defense.

              There are lots of situations in which a threat to kill is not terrorism. Quit trying to dilute the definition of terrorism.

              Oh, and she sung a song in Spanish, and was threatened with death for not singing in American English. That screams political to me…

              Okay, and…? I never disputed that this situation counted as terrorism; I only took issue with your overly-broad definition. In fact, it’s doubly weird that you’re choosing to die on this hill because you didn’t even need to go overboard making the definition wider than it is when the situation easily meets the real definition of it anyway! The guy you initially replied to was wrong and you would have been correct, except that you overstated your argument for no good reason.

              Words have meanings and you’re using one of them wrong. That’s all.

    • lmmarsano@lemmynsfw.com
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      2 days ago

      People typically have definitions like this in mind:

      1. the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that-
        1. involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State;
        2. appear to be intended-
          1. to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;
          2. to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or
          3. to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and
        3. occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States

      Acts (1) dangerous to life (2) designed to coerce a population or a government. Otherwise, any threat inimical to life would qualify.

      • 4am@lemm.ee
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        1 day ago

        Death is dangerous to life and groups of chuds threatening people who don’t sing their national anthem in their preferred language are attempting to coerce a population.

        I think people in America typically have a definition like this:

        “Terrorists” are defined as looking exactly like Osama Bin Laden and shouting “ISLAMIC JIHAD ALLAHU AKBAR LALALLALALALALALAL” before exploding like a stuck lemming from the video game “Lemmings”.

        They also think that politics is operated purely on lies and name calling for power grabs and so therefore since they gave the terrorist label to brown people, they can’t ever be one and all their actions are excusable since it’s impossible for them to be a terrorist.

        • lmmarsano@lemmynsfw.com
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          1 day ago

          An act directed to a single person isn’t an act intimidating or coercing the civil population. In contrast, such an act directed at/broadcast to the general civil population does qualify as intimidation or coercion of the civil population.

    • Manifish_Destiny@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Not necessarily. Not unless they’re trying to force an ideology.

      If I threaten to kill you because I plainly don’t like you, that’s not really making me a terrorist.

      • Wren@lemmy.worldM
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        2 days ago

        If you threaten to kill someone, you are using terror to manipulate them into being fearful.

        A death threat because you don’t like someone is still an intention to instill fear in someone. So yes. You’d be a terrorist.

        By definition: terrorism is the calculated use of violence or the threat of violence to instill fear, often to achieve political, religious, or ideological goals. Killing someone out of hate is an ideological goal.

        • Manifish_Destiny@lemmy.world
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          23 hours ago

          Sorry, that just doesn’t follow the actual definition of terrorism. Remove the comma, and “often” and we’re real closer.

          Literally the first result on Google From wiki:

          Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims.[1]

          Not every murderer is a terrorist.

        • thebestaquaman@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          Killing someone out of hate is an ideological goal.

          In most cases, no. All hate is not ideological hate, and most killings are not ideological either. Most of the violence we see in the world is due to people’s personal relationships with each other, or are the result of some spontaneous fight.

          The problem with what you’re doing here is you’re diluting the meaning of the word “terrorism”. You wrote out the definition, but you don’t seem to understand it. The key element is that terrorism is not just instilling fear, but using that fear to obtain political or ideological goals.

          If instilling fear is sufficient to make someone a terrorist, any violent criminal or anyone threatening others becomes a terrorist, and the word loses its meaning.