Terrorism

The purpose of terrorism is not to kill but to terrorize. Its purpose is to put a society (or section of society) in such fear that they would rather give in than face the terror. It also aims to use fear as a way of affecting an economy, to force the ‘owners’ of that economy to change their ways.

The recent attacks on the World Trade Center were said to have been aimed at maximum casualties. If that were true the planes would have crashed into the building further down and would have done so within minutes of each other. Instead the first one hit very high up to ensure that it was seen from all over the city. The next one left enough of a delay to ensure that TV stations all over the world were already broadcasting live pictures of the towers when it hit. It hit only half way down because if it hit further down other buildings would have got in the way of the good TV coverage. As it was it could be seen from every angle.

Don’t believe me? Look again at the pictures! Still don’t believe me? Why pick that early in the morning when many people were only on their way to work, why not pick midday? In Japan and Australia it was late evening when many would be watching TV, whilst on the West Coast of the US people would wake up to the news. The attacks were timed to ensure world-wide TV coverage.

I’m not trying to excuse that scum in any way, its even more sick to calculate the TV coverage of such an attack than it is to do it just to try and kill. The point I am making is that by changing our lives just because of a fear of the highly unlikely we are doing just what the terrorists want. We have to take some precautions but we have to keep them in perspective and weigh up the usefulness of the measures we are taking against the impact it is having on our lives and the lives of others.

Fighting for democracy isn’t about taking a gun and shooting someone. The biggest contribution we can all make to democracy is not giving in to the fear and getting on with our lives. We should also support human rights and free speech for all. Fanaticism breeds on hatred and hardship, by promoting justice and equality we can take away the fuel that creates fanatics. Supporting one lot of extremists in order to combat another is the sort of policy that will just prolong conflicts and get more people killed.