Mass shooting at Church in US

I recognise the Boston Bomber bloke. Who's the second kid?

Good point, though. There were reams of paper written about those Boston brothers, going into all sorts of detail about why they might have ended up the way they did. One of them even made the cover of Rolling Stone ffs.
 
To anyone who is so sure of the definition of a terrorist, what is the difference between a terrorist and a revolutionary then? Violence? Righteous vs unprovoked? The lines are not always as clear as it seems. And I speak this not with a leaning towards either side.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
I recognise the Boston Bomber bloke. Who's the second kid?

Good point, though. There were reams of paper written about those Boston brothers, going into all sorts of detail about why they might have ended up the way they did. One of them even made the cover of Rolling Stone ffs.
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Jihadi John
 
Pogue Mahone said:
I recognise the Boston Bomber bloke. Who's the second kid?

Good point, though. There were reams of paper written about those Boston brothers, going into all sorts of detail about why they might have ended up the way they did. One of them even made the cover of Rolling Stone ffs.
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tsarnaev-rollingstone-290.jpeg


I mentioned this point in the pilot thread. Wiki entry...

Tsarnaev was the subject of a cover story for an August 2013 issue of Rolling Stone entitled "The Bomber: How a Popular, Promising Student Was Failed by His Family, Fell into Radical Islam and Became a Monster." The magazine drew large amounts of criticism for this decision. Boston Mayor Tom Menino wrote that the cover "rewards a terrorist with celebrity treatment. It is ill-conceived, at best, and re-affirms a terrible message that destruction gains fame for killers and their 'causes'"[117] while Massachusetts State Police sergeant Sean Murphy stated that "glamorizing the face of terror is not just insulting to the family members of those killed in the line of duty, it also could be an incentive to those who may be unstable to do something to get their face on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine."[118] The New York Times used the same photo on their front page in May 2013,[119] but did not draw criticism. Rolling Stone columnist Matt Taibbi criticized those who took offense at the cover, arguing that their offense-taking was the result of their associating Rolling Stone with glamor instead of news,[120] stating that The New York Times did not draw the criticism that Rolling Stone did, "because everyone knows the Times is a news organization. Not everyone knows that about Rolling Stone... because many people out there understandably do not know that Rolling Stone is also a hard-news publication."[120]

The editors of Rolling Stone posted the following response:

Our hearts go out to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing, and our thoughts are always with them and their families. The cover story we are publishing this week falls within the traditions of journalism and Rolling Stone’s long-standing commitment to serious and thoughtful coverage of the most important political and cultural issues of our day. The fact that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is young, and in the same age group as many of our readers, makes it all the more important for us to examine the complexities of this issue and gain a more complete understanding of how a tragedy like this happens. –THE EDITORS[121]
Hours after this happened, many retailers that sold the magazine, such as CVS Pharmacy,[122] BJ's Wholesale Club (which also no longer sells any future Rolling Stone issues),[123] and others, announced that they would no longer sell the issue.[124]

In December 2013, the Rolling Stone Tsarnaev cover was named the "Hottest Cover Of The Year" by Adweek magazine, with newsstand sales doubling from 60,000 to 120,000.[125][126] The photo on the cover was taken by Tsarnaev himself, not a professional studio photographer.[127]
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I've never seen this kind of backlash before. An attempt to describe Tsarnaev as anything but a savage terrorist bastard (which he was, mind) was shut down instantly.
 
Saddens me to say I've become numb to these kinds of tragedies nowadays. The only one that elicited emotion in me was the Newtown shooting, because I lived in the area for a while. Otherwise it's a silent murmur and shadow on the brow, then it's back to whatever I'm doing.
 
adexkola said:
tsarnaev-rollingstone-290.jpeg


I mentioned this point in the pilot thread. Wiki entry...



I've never seen this kind of backlash before. An attempt to describe Tsarnaev as anything but a savage terrorist bastard (which he was, mind) was shut down instantly.
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The backlash was daft but all part of the hysteria in America about terrorist. Still, the point stands, it's a myth that people only care about or discuss what might cause a white man to end up going on a killing spree.
 
Obama:

I’ve had to make statements like this too many times. Communities like this have had to endure tragedies like this too many times,” he said. “Innocent people were hurt because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting a gun. Sometime as a country we’ll have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence doesn’t happen in other advanced counties. It doesn’t happen in other places with this frequency. It is within our power to do something about it.
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Pogue Mahone said:
The backlash was daft but all part of the hysteria in America about terrorist. Still, the point stands, it's a myth that people only care about or discuss what might cause a white man to end up going on a killing spree.
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:confused: That's not my argument though, I think the average guy on the street reads the news with an open mind generally.

I think the media narratives (consciously or subconsciously) are biased in that way though. And media to some extent influence stereotypes, which eventually results in how the average person profiles other people and groups. More specifically to this thread, I've read several articles detailing how this suspect has black friends on facebook (how is this relevant to anything???), how he was a jovial kid, etc... One correspondent on CNN said we don't know the cause for this (he has admitted he hates black people you doofus), and so on.
 
Wolverine said:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2015/06/18/fox-amp-friends-exploits-south-carolina-church/204046

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/the...pinning-of-the-charleston-shooting-has-begun/

^and this is why absolutely nothing will happen. Conservative talk radio, fox news spring right into action. They have an enormous sway on public opinion.
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Interesting. Not an American so I cannot really give any informed judgement on whether guns on the streets should be banned or not. That said, I've grown up in two countries with guns being disallowed on the streets and (relative?) peace, so there is inherent bias there.
 
Darkpulse said:
Interesting. Not an American so I cannot really give any informed judgement on whether guns on the streets should be banned or not. That said, I've grown up in two countries with guns being disallowed on the streets and (relative?) peace, so there is inherent bias there.
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It's bias backed by common sense and statistics.

Americans in general don't want to trade their guns in exchange for a reduction in the amount of incidents like this. It is what it is.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
I recognise the Boston Bomber bloke. Who's the second kid?

Good point, though. There were reams of paper written about those Boston brothers, going into all sorts of detail about why they might have ended up the way they did. One of them even made the cover of Rolling Stone ffs.
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I unsubscribed from Rolling Stone that day. They put a pic of the Boston Bomber on the front page and completely sensationalized it.
 
adexkola said:
It's bias backed by common sense and statistics.

Americans in general don't want to trade their guns in exchange for a reduction in the amount of incidents like this. It is what it is.
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20 children and 6 staff members died during Sandy Hook just 2 years ago...if that didnt spark some sort of gun control legislation then nothing can.
Americans have to decide at some point that the interests of the people outweigh the interests of big business ..until then they are doomed to have corrupt, completely bought out Politicians who cater primarily to the 1%.
 
It's just fecking terrible out there, people are dying needlessly because of bad bullshit arguments. Not just right wing conservative types but libertarians too. Too many people buy into that nonsense, majority of Americans want some level of gun control. But there's absolutely zero chance of getting any sort of traction on this issue, at all in the forseeable future.
 
adexkola said:
:confused: That's not my argument though, I think the average guy on the street reads the news with an open mind generally.
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Fair enough but it's definitely an argument you put across.

adexkola said:
Another thing that grates people's gears is that there is a tendency for white criminals to be contextualized. Let's assume the suspect is caught. You can expect tons of articles on his horrible upbringing in a household rife with child abuse. Depression. How the system failed him. Pictures of him at his baptism, baseball game, with kids...

With minority suspects? Mugshot. Extensive pull of crime records. No attempt to "humanize". Oh, and tendency of minority populations to turn to violence.
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Can't see it happening in our lifetime.

Plus if it did happen I'd hate to be the guy in charge of enforcing the changes. Bound to be a bit of a logistical nightmare.
 
sullydnl said:
Can't see it happening in our lifetime.

Plus if it did happen I'd hate to be the guy in charge of enforcing the changes. Bound to be a bit of a logistical nightmare.
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State level changes perhaps as a starter. Then a success of which might prompt other changes to take place. Massive cultural shift needs to happen, but with the amount of pro-gun narratives online and on the radio, no chance.

And what's sad is that this particular cultural issue is literally a matter of life and death.
 
adexkola said:
Like who?

Yes, SC has the death penalty. He'll probably take a plea deal that sentences him to life imprisonment.
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No DA is offering a plea on a case that's this open and shut. His attorney might try to get one, but I don't think they'll get one. I guess his attorney could claim he was high as a mitigating factor but it's been long enough that there's no way to prove it.

They've got witnesses, video evidence, and probably a perpetrator who's proud of his actions. At this point, they probably don't even need the gun, if he didn't throw it away.
 
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Gun policy aside, i never understod and never will how people can do these sort of things just because some one dont look the same or belive the same as you do.

I just cant wrap my head around it.

Rest in peace to all the victims and my thoughts goes out to the family and friends
 
Sir Matt said:
No DA is offering a plea on a case that's this open and shut. His attorney might try to get one, but I don't think they'll get one. I guess his attorney could claim he was high as a mitigating factor but it's been long enough that there's no way to prove it.

They've got witnesses, video evidence, and probably a perpetrator who's proud of his actions. At this point, they probably don't even need the gun, if he didn't throw it away.
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That is very true. What if he pleads guilty?
 
I suspect the actual wording used especially by the media matters a lot more when you're from the minority group that the media is often directed towards and not too much when you're from the majority group relatively shielded from those reports.

We all know how both the media and people would react if a Muslim man walked into a Texan Church and shot 9 people.

How is a hate crime not terrorism btw? This guy clearly hates black people. So the shooting of black people in their church is supposed to do what? Not inspire fear in the black community? Just to randomly kill? Does hatred of a specific group (whether that be blacks, Jews, Muslims, Gays, Whites, whatever) come about in a vacuum? Or does it come with ideas and theories about how best to deal with whatever that group may happen to be?

Why is this guy any less of a terrorist than the Boston bombers, who as far as I can remember were self radicalised and not a member of any organisation?
 
africanspur said:
I suspect the actual wording used especially by the media matters a lot more when you're from the minority group that the media is often directed towards and not too much when you're from the majority group relatively shielded from those reports.

We all know how both the media and people would react if a Muslim man walked into a Texan Church and shot 9 people.

How is a hate crime not terrorism btw? This guy clearly hates black people. So the shooting of black people in their church is supposed to do what? Not inspire fear in the black community? Just to randomly kill? Does hatred of a specific group (whether that be blacks, Jews, Muslims, Gays, Whites, whatever) come about in a vacuum? Or does it come with ideas and theories about how best to deal with whatever that group may happen to be?

Why is this guy any less of a terrorist than the Boston bombers, who as far as I can remember were self radicalised and not a member of any organisation?
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It's about your aims and what you hoped to achieve with the crime.

If you shoot black people because you hate black people then you've committed a hate crime.

If you shoot black people because you want to coerce the population/state into behaving in a way that suits whatever ideology you subscribe to then you've committed terrorism.

I think.
 
That is my point.

How can you shoot black people as an isolated event? You're doing it just as a 'release'? Or you're doing it in a context where you want to bring about fear into that community?
 
africanspur said:
That is my point.

How can you shoot black people as an isolated event? You're doing it just as a 'release'? Or you're doing it in a context where you want to bring about fear into that community?
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Dunno, why does anybody kill anybody? There are loads of potential reasons I guess. I'd need more information before putting my pop psychology hat on.
 
Sorry don't really know what a pop psychology hat is but I imagine most people don't kill completely randomly.

Especially when those people have pictures of them with Rhodesian and apartheid era South Africa flags on and was rumoured to have said before shooting (admittedly not exactly permissible in court and perhaps not true...) "I have to do it. You're raping our women. You're taking over our country. And you have to go."
 
africanspur said:
I suspect the actual wording used especially by the media matters a lot more when you're from the minority group that the media is often directed towards and not too much when you're from the majority group relatively shielded from those reports.

We all know how both the media and people would react if a Muslim man walked into a Texan Church and shot 9 people.

How is a hate crime not terrorism btw? This guy clearly hates black people. So the shooting of black people in their church is supposed to do what? Not inspire fear in the black community? Just to randomly kill? Does hatred of a specific group (whether that be blacks, Jews, Muslims, Gays, Whites, whatever) come about in a vacuum? Or does it come with ideas and theories about how best to deal with whatever that group may happen to be?

Why is this guy any less of a terrorist than the Boston bombers, who as far as I can remember were self radicalised and not a member of any organisation?
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The Boston bombers were affiliated with radical islamic ideologies and justified their actions as retaliation for American aggression in the middle East.

Assuming today's shooting was motivated by nothing other than a hatred of black people there's a fairly clear difference.

The whole obsession with what is and isn't terrorism is a bit silly though, I agree. Especially with the way people seem to think assuming a murderer is a terrorist is somehow making them out to be a worse person than assuming they killed for no reason other than hatred.

Also, I think the method of murder influenced assumptions. One bloke going postal with guns will inevitably cause assumptions he's a mentally ill loner but the use of coordinated explosive devices implies a level of sophistication you'd usually associate with a terrorist organisation.
 
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Pogue Mahone said:
The Boston bombers were affiliated with radical islamic ideologies and justified their actions as retaliation for American aggression in the middle East.

Assuming today's shooting was motivated by nothing other than a hatred of black people there's a fairly clear difference.

The whole obsession with what is and isn't terrorism is a bit silly though, I agree. Especially with the way people seem to think assuming a murderer is a terrorist is somehow making them out to be a worse person than assuming they killed for no reason other than hatred.

Also, I think the method of murder influenced assumptions. One bloke going postal will inevitably cause assumptions he's a mentally ill loner but coordinated explosive devices implies a level of sophistication you'd associated with a terrorist organisation.
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They were. But as far as I remember (I am willing to be proved wrong) they were not members of any organisation. They were not members of AQ, ISIS, Jubhat al Nusra, Ansar Beit al Maqdis or any other organisation, with either local or global ambitions.

I would say hatred of black people is a radical ideology. I'm sure the guy also had what he thinks are excellent justifications for his actions. Whether its because blacks are raping, killing, taking over whites, whatever. People are not racist for no reason whatsoever, they will have reasons and justifications (almost always incorrect of course) as to why they hate whichever race that is. In some cases, ie this one, these justifications can lead to violence and death.

These white supremacists have their sites too, have their literature. They have their justifications for what they think whatever group they hate have done.

As far as I'm aware, building homemade bombs isn't actually technically that difficult. The problem is much more with acquiring the equipment.
 
Surely you would agree that, historically, a coordinated bombing spree is much much more likely to be the actions of terrorists than one man going on a shooting spree?

It's all about the most likely explanation for any given scenario. That's what causes the media to make certain assumptions before all the facts are known. I think you're looking for agendas that aren't there.

Unless you're talking about Fox News. In which case, please ignore everything I just typed.
 
africanspur said:
Sorry don't really know what a pop psychology hat is but I imagine most people don't kill completely randomly.

Especially when those people have pictures of them with Rhodesian and apartheid era South Africa flags on and was rumoured to have said before shooting (admittedly not exactly permissible in court and perhaps not true...) "I have to do it. You're raping our women. You're taking over our country. And you have to go."
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Context is key I guess, the overall story would tend to lead us towards one definition over the other.

For example, say a guy tries to assassinate the president. If he claims he's doing so for political reasons then we might consider him a terrorist. If he claims the same thing but also has schizophrenia then we might not see him in that light at all. Motivation, aims, methodology and the general context of the crime would all influence the way we define it.

In this case we don't really know the full story so it's a bit hard to call. Generally though you'd expect a terrorist to have more specific and societal goals than just indiscriminately hating black people for random reasons.
 
adexkola said:
That is very true. What if he pleads guilty?
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That doesn't guarantee they won't still execute him. There have been cases where guilty pleas still resulted in the death penalty. One guy even requested it. I could see them drop it if all of the families say they don't want it, but I doubt it.

I wouldn't be surprised if the attorney for Tsarnaev takes up his case, especially if it goes federal. He could get life in a federal case but death if South Carolina decided to try him as well, they could seek the death penalty. The Feds could charge him for one of the murders and the state for the other 8 or some combination. That way it's not double-jeopardy.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Surely you would agree that, historically, a coordinated bombing spree is much much more likely to be the actions of terrorists than one man going on a shooting spree?

It's all about the most likely explanation for any given scenario. That's what causes the media to make certain assumptions before all the facts are known. I think you're looking for agendas that aren't there.

Unless you're talking about Fox News. In which case, please ignore everything I just typed.
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Of course but that isn't really the part that I have an issue with. The problem is the underlying assumption of what you've said in the first place. That a man who goes into a black church, who clearly has a problem with black people, who has been shown wearing racist paraphernalia in the past, is still assumed to be a lone man on a shooting spree. That, as long as you're not a Muslim, you can get away without being called a 'terrorist' unless you've gone to the effort to make a video of yourself detailing certain policy points or have written a manifesto.

I really don't think I am and like I said, agendas and wording matters much more to members of minorities, those who are most affected by these agendas and wording than they do to other groups
 
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