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Joanna Gray's avatar

I’m having trouble with the use of the word ‘terrorism’. I think it’s being bandied about too much these days. As is “crisis” and “tragedy”. And, “fill in the blank-phobia”. It’s important that the power of these words not be diluted by overuse in situations where they’re not warranted.

Perhaps I’m behind in terms of what information is being released about the young man who allegedly committed the act, but I’m not aware of his belonging to any political group—or any group—the aims of which he was hoping to further. Surely he would need to be in order to qualify as a terrorist? It seems to me his actions were essentially driven by his own unbridled hate, pure and simple. Probably amplified, as others have said here, by social media. Awful and very very sad.

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Zwer's avatar

The problem I see is that this young man is not alone responsible for his act of terror. For too long society has ignored (or at best wrung its hands at) the vile rhetoric which has created the conditions for this type of act to happen. Too much of our media is fuelled by hate, and then continues to profit on its results. We know from the Stanford Prison Experiment that anonymity allows people to dehumanize each other, yet the greatest/worst communication tool the world has seen is based on it. We must call this and persecute this crime as an act of terror, and then put in the work to remove the conditions that helped to cause it.

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