a crossover thread.

[Gnostic Yevon]

So writing a paper advocating Jihad is similar to writing a paper supporting the violent overthrow of the US government (which is illegal and will get you a night in jail talking to the FBI). You will only be arrested if you are advocating the violent overthrow of a government.

How is writing an essay on Jihad similar to overthrowing the US government? It could mean other things as well you know. The first impression that people get when they see a muslim person writing a paper on Jihad is that that person is a terrorist, or that they are related to a terrorist. What if people saw a non-muslim person writing a paper on Jihad? Would they arrest that person too? I don't think that they would. Lately, most things have been focused on muslims. I could be wrong seeing how I am not part of any government, but I can get a grasp of what's going on in the world by watching the news. So far of what I've seen, any suspicious acts by muslims are immediately taken as "terrorist" aggressions. What if "OTHER" extremist groups are doing the terrorist bombings and the muslims are getting blamed for it? It seems pretty logical. Other non-muslim terrorists are taking their chances to blow stuff up and not worrying because muslims will eventually get blamed. Proper evidence is needed to figure out who is actually behind most of the bombings. Some of the extremist groups admit that they have done the attacks, but some of them don't, and the blame gets pinned on the muslims. This kind of thing is happening everywhere around the world. Most governments are now blaming muslims as the prime terrorist groups.

I could be totally wrong, but every time I watch the news or read it, there is always something about "muslims suspected of terrorist agressions ", or "More suicide bombs by muslim terrorists "

First off, Jihad means holy war. It has a secondary meaning as in "a holy war against evil inside you", or something to that effect. But when they mean that, it's usually said as an "internal Jihad". So if you are talking about Jihad, unless you are talking about the "internal Jihad", you mean a war. As in a violent conflict. Communism is an economic theory. If a person is a communist, he believes in certain things, like collective ownership and so on. It's not a violent ideology, so I don't care if someone believes it. If a kid writes a paper in which he talks about Communism especially in a positive light, it would be pretty safe to assume that either he is a Communist or knows someone who is. I think writing about Jihad the same way. If a person chooses to write about Jihad especially in a positive light, I would assume that the person either believes that way himself or knows someone who does. It's a reasonable assumption that a person isn't going to write about something like that without some connection. And because the definition of Jihad is holy war, if a kid writes about Jihad, it should be checked.

As a second point, I'll be shocked if it turns out that the teacher never read the paper before he called the cops.

Lately, I haven't even heard anything about any other attacks made by other extremist groups around the world. All I hear is muslims did this, muslims did that... and so on. The whole world is standing on edge to see what kind of "diabolical plot the muslims will think of next" instead of what kind of "diabolical plot terrorists will think of next". The term "terrorist" is now mostly being directed at muslims.
Once again, I could be totally wrong seeing how I'm only speculating with what I see on T.V. or read on the newspapers. If anyone else can disprove what I've said, I'll glady take back everything I've said here.

Well, that's because after the peace with Britain, the IRA hasn't been active. Other than 9-11 and the Spanish Train Bombing (depending on your view of the intifada, that could be international as well) most terrorism is domestic and internal conflicts of forgein nations aren't covered in the USA. So it's skewed a lot toward the al-qaida type terrorists. Venezuela has had a civil war for 30 years. no press at all. Rawanda was a genocide, but Ruwanda doesn't get much press in the USa. I think the reason that the ME gets so much press is pretty much Oil and Israel.

[T-MaN]

I know what Jihad means, I was just curious to see why you thought Jihad was tied with the overthrow of the US government. To me you made it sound as if the whole purpose of Jihad was to take over America or something.

[Cloud No.9]

not allowed to talk about overthrowing the us government.... bugger... been doing that myself, various discussions regarding attacks that would have no civillian casualties, economic and electronic attacks.

"You can appologize to the guy's family and even give them money afterward for damages etc." but american never does that anyway, look at the men released from cuba, 3 years under torture some with conditions and injuries that will last their entire life, and get nothing. vietnam, nothing, people living in the tora bora, nothing, people bombed during the iraq war, nothing. he will be shot and nothing will be done. and is one innocent man killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time be what happens in a war? and give them compensation? this is what sickens me about that country. "we shot your daddy, go buy yourself some new shoes that will make up for it" why does money make up for shooting a man in cold blood? there is no excuse for shooting man without warning. this is the same as arrest without trial. there is absolute no possible law that can govern it. if you start that then what you can do is shoot a man then claim you thought he had a bomb. it's totally immoral, illegal, liable to corruption and unpoliceable.

and it's not just torture in cuba, american is guilty of, alot of inamtes are shiiped to syria, egypt, turkmenistan where they can use far worse forms of torture, including, boiling, branding, castration, beating, stretching and hanging.

is that really what peole are saying is correct? "it's okay we think he's a bad man lets ship him to get his balls smashed" at what point did morals get like this where you can turn your back on such attrocities and ignore it? call it part of a war? say it's not you who is commiting it even though you shipped him there to gain intelligence for you. am i missing something here? why is this allowed to persist?

my point about communism was actually refering to the way communists were rounded up in the 1960's and nazi germant and how that is comparable now to the way muslims are now treated in america.

[Gnostic Yevon]

look I'm talking about the real world example you gave me.

The guy is inside the van and you think there is a bomb inside that will kill a lot of inoocent people. You has a cop or the bombsquad or whatever have one chance to stop him. That's the situation, correct? Now I can't be 100% sure that the guy really has a bomb unless I open the door. unfortunately, if I try to do that with him still alive, and there is a bomb -- he presses the button and probably you will be seriously injured and besides which at least a dozen other people die. Annouce yourself and he'll probably push the button rather than be taken. You can let a person sit in the middle of a neighborhood with the potential to take out dozens of people (which your intelligence has a good reason to believe in this example). If the only way to prevent a tragedy from happening is to shoot the guy, then that's how it is. The alternatives are not good. I admit that. But the consequences of announcing yourself to the guy in the van is possibly the deaths of a dozen people including the guy himself. the consequence of a sniper taking him out is that AT WORST one person dies and there is no bomb.

Yes in a perfect world such choices would not be neccessary. But that's not real life. I can't just redo that situation until I come up with the perfect answer. I don't think I could live with myself if I could have prevented the bomb from going off but didn't because I didn't want to risk not following procedures.

[Cloud No.9]

what's wrong with a nice little evacuation? we aren't ever going to be talking a terrorist with a nuclear weapon, that idea is a totally idiiotic one which totally ignores the true semantics of nuclear weaponary.

if you thought you knew the oklahoma bombing was coming why not just empty the building? you might be wrong and you might have just wasted a few people's time but it's far better than blowing out a mans brain who might not be guilty, or leaving folk to die. killing on the presumption of guilt must be considered morally wrong.

[ShunNakamura]

Well If I was mr. suicide bomber in the back of that truck.. I would simply detonate the moment someone tried to evacuate.. .. nope not getting away from me.

If you mean evacuating before the truck even gets there... well If there I really wanted to just kill some people for terror.. if the place looked like it wasn't largely populated.. I would just drive to a more populated place.. and *BOOM*.

Evacuation can be nice.. but it can sometimes only change the target... making it harder to prevent.

And don't we have scanners now-a-days that could give us a REALLY good idea whether or not the bomb was in the truck(depending on time constraints such actions could or could not be applicatable).

[T-MaN]

If a van was outside with a guy holding a bomb, wouldn't it be just safer to stay inside? Unless you are talking about a suspected attack on a particular area in which evacuation does not sound like a bad idea.

Even though it is harsh, killing a known person holding a bomb may just be the only solution. Although it may be a solution, it should be kept as a last resort rather than a main priority.

[Sasquatch]

Again, the reference wasn't made to a guy in a minivan waiting for his kids, we know the guy has a bomb. If you try to evacuate, he sees it, and sets it off. If you try to disarm it while he still has control over it, he sets it off. Depending on where it is, it would be extremely difficult to evacuate the area anyway--do you know how hard it would be to evacuate somewhere like New York City? Most of us have seen on TV the evacuations of parts of the Atlantic coastline when a major hurricane is expected, just relate that to more people and less area.

If he's got a bomb, most likely he has a message. Not many people would do something like that without the public knowing the source or the reason. He may just want to let people know why he's planned this, he may want to negotiate, whatever. Either way, if he is a threat to other people--whether it be one person or thirty million--the threat needs to be eliminated.

Cloud 9, in response to your question to me, I have a question for you. Would you approve of the use of "cruel" interrogation techniques to prevent something like 9/11? If you had one of the guys responsible and knew something was coming but didn't know what or when, would you rather hurt the guy a bit until he tells you, or be nice to him and end up with thousands of innocent civilian lives lost?

[Cloud No.9]

i don't believe in cruel techniques under any circumstance. you cannot invent a scenario where you defiently know a man knows something, that doesn't happen there is always the chance you are wrong, you intelligence might be flawed, the man who handed him over might be corrupt, mistakes might have been made. a few hundred thousand iraqi's will tell you there is no such thing as 100% proof and why you cannot rely on such things to take lives.

you would never need to evacuate new york city as a bomb of that size is not feasible. and if you are evacuating an area that size because you do not know where the bomb is then you don't know where the bomber is either.

such a scenario cannot exist in the real world. so you do not know the man has a bomb, you think he has a bomb. are you prepared to shoot a man on a think?

you need absolute proof before you can take a man's life or torture a man. otherwise you are led down a very dark alley.

[Gnostic Yevon]

i don't believe in cruel techniques under any circumstance. you cannot invent a scenario where you defiently know a man knows something, that doesn't happen there is always the chance you are wrong, you intelligence might be flawed, the man who handed him over might be corrupt, mistakes might have been made. a few hundred thousand iraqi's will tell you there is no such thing as 100% proof and why you cannot rely on such things to take lives.

you would never need to evacuate new york city as a bomb of that size is not feasible. and if you are evacuating an area that size because you do not know where the bomb is then you don't know where the bomber is either.

such a scenario cannot exist in the real world. so you do not know the man has a bomb, you think he has a bomb. are you prepared to shoot a man on a think?

you need absolute proof before you can take a man's life or torture a man. otherwise you are led down a very dark alley.

Umm we can't even prove 100% that we landed on the moon. If you're going to wait for absolute proof, then for all intents and purposes you wouldn't take the guy's life even if your best intel says he has a nuke in the van. Because in the real world you'll never know for sure. Even our court system is not based on the absolute proof idea, because absolute proof is rarely possible. Instead it's beyond a reasonable doubt. meaning that if your 100% proof standard applied to all crimes, the prisons should be emtied. It just isn't realistic to wait for 100% absolute proof.

The second thing is that in the van case, being wrong has grave consequences. Let the bomb go off while you are negotiating and talking, and quite frankly you will have some civillian deaths, deaths that will not happen if you take the guy out. Now if an evacuation is possible, yes that's probably the best course of action. But I suspect that Susquach is right that the guy in the van is going to blow it up if he sees a massive evacuation. Now if it is possible to arrest the guy and not have anyone die, that's the best answer. But to be honest with you, I think the odds of that happening are fairly low. So you just can't count on the "best solution", you have to work toward the one with the greatest odds of success.

I'd say the same thing in the torture case. If I have a limited time to find the bomb, and I have strong evidence that he knows where the bomb is, then I'm going to make him uncomfortable. I don't think it will work to just sit down over starbucks and talk to him. He's been trained not to answer questions. I don't think I can rely on the rest of the police force to tear apart every building in NYC to find the bomb in a limited time. NYC is HUGE and if the bomb is a car bomb, it's probably moving the whole time. So really both situations are very similar in my mind. If the only probable way to prevent civillian deaths is to torture the suspect you have in custody, then that's how it is. I'd prefer to not have to do so, but you have to protect the civillian population of the city.

[lordblazer]

Everybody is entitled to human rights. But not everybody is entitled to the rights of American citizens, or the even the rights of enemy Prisoners of War.

You make a big deal out of this "torture", when for one thing, you don't have a clue what's going on in American prison camps--and even if you think you do, it's nothing near "torture"--and for another, it's not a method of entertainment, it's a method of extracting information that can and does save innocent lives, both military and civilian. (Don't bother bringing up Abu Gharab, that was mainly for entertainment, that was illegal, and that is being dealt with.)

Shooting a man with his finger on the trigger of a bomb that would kill millions is illegal? Where the hell did you get that? If he must be shot, he must be shot. Now, they might try to shoot the detonator out of his hand, or they might try to wound him so that they can drag him away and take control of the situation, but neither would be illegal. We're not talking about some dad sitting in a minivan waiting for his kids, we're talking about a terrorist with a nuke, are we not? Where are you getting this stuff from? Oh wait, nevermind, I think I know.

How many American civizens are in Gitmo? And what ties did they have that got them sent there?

on this sadly i agree with SAS...Cloud you love to bash on americans there are plenty of countries and terrorist groups that do torture people.Some countries puts 1000 volts of AC current through a persons testicles to get them to talk.torture is everywhere and you can't be a bastard and say America is the worse country to torture its prisoners.

[Sasquatch]

Oh yes, let's not punish anybody because there's no way to be 100% sure of their guilt.

"you would never need to evacuate new york city as a bomb of that size is not feasible."

Ever heard of nuclear weapons? They're feasible.

Your refusal to use "cruel techniques" to possibly save millions of lives reveals a great deal about the content of your character, or lack thereof. There is no logical reason to protect the "human rights" of one man and cast aside the lives of hundreds, thousands, or millions of others, especially civilian lives.

[Cloud No.9]

sasquatch nuclear weapons are not feasible in terrorism i won't get into the semantics of why reprocessing uranium in your front room isn't possible, nor is recreating the technology for such a weapon if you did steal processed uranium.

lordblazer yes they are plenty of nasty countries out there which use nasty methods of torture which america happilly ships out it's suspects to for a friendly cosy chat. and america isn't the worst country in the world when it comes down to torturing suspects. but is that what you want from your country? to be "not as bad as other really nasty countries"? i'm sorry but i though in america there was some kind of pride in being a great country that hadn't sunk so low as to say "well we don't behead anyone do we?, so we're alright" "torture is okay because we think he's a bad man so who cares about him being a human being and all" to better than countries which torture in such horrible ways is not a badge of honor.

i think the term used in law is "beyond any reosnable doubt" and this should also be taken into consideration for shooting any suspect, you need means, motive and opportunity and not all based on half assed intelligence, gossip or guesses.

[Sasquatch]

You're saying terrorists couldn't buy a nuclear weapon? Open your eyes a bit. Plus, you have the "dirty bomb"--I won't even bother explaining that to you--and other types of weapons designed to cause massive amounts of civilian casualties.

Cloud 9, you have already dismissed anything else you could say on this issue by telling me that you would argue against the use of "torture" on one suspected terrorist that might save the lives of thousands of innocent civilians. You place too much value on comfort and not enough on life and freedom.

[Cloud No.9]

sasquatch i hate to tell you that buying a nuclear bomb is rather difficult these days. you know with most of the world thinking that putting up a nuclear weapons store next to wal-mart is a little bit silly. if they ever did get hold of one from buying it would be in the form of a missle or bomb as this is how all nuclear weapons are made. now if you want to explain to be how you get a nuclear bomb or missle system into the us without anyone raising an eyebrow at it then yes you may be in trouble. this is of course if terrorists can find such a country to buy it from, afford it and convert it til a useable weapon without it sticking out like a sore thumb.

dirty bombs on the other hand..... have debateable usefullness. which we can discuss if you want but i'll leave it at that for now.

and no i don't believe in torturing an innocent man. sorry if that makes me crazy but you know.... just something i feel uneasy about.