One man's freedom fighter as they say - would it have been wrong to fight against Hitler with all weapons available?

Were the IRA wrong to kill innocent people? They achieved their aim through violence after all, forcing the UK to the peace table.

So all this talk of banning incitement to terrorism - should we support it?

Should we ban people from killing - or inciting others? We do, after all. We are jailing people for urging revolt.

Or do we say there is no excuse or reason to do so? And live with torture, cruelty, murder, slaughter in the name of God (or in the name of democracy, as we have pretended in Iraq).

Depends which side you are on !

To the Germans, the French resistance were terrorists - but to the British (who supplied their weapons etc) they were freedom fighters.

Incidentally, yesterday was the anniversary of the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba (in 1961) when exiled Cubans (financed and supported by the USA, attempted to overthrow Castro.

At first the USA denied any involvement - but later admitted it. Kennedy's first foreign policy disaster (but not by a long way the last time the Yankers would be defeated trying to impose their wishes on other countries).

What a moronic post. FFS.

It may have been John Stuart Mill who wrote something to the effect that's alright to speak against a person to a crowd but not if you're outside their house.

There is a line that should not be crossed, unfortunately it is very difficult to define that line beforehand.

I certainly think we should "ban people from killing", that's fairly black and white.

Jailing people for urging revolt is surely a matter of degree. If that revolt is murder then I object to the murder. If that revolt is to condemn a system I cannot object.

On balance I think I would prefer not to suppress speech even if that means some are harmed as a consequence. To ban voicing opinion "just in case" strikes me as a step on the road to dictatorship.

and don't forget-the CIA plotted with a Cuban born exile to bring down a Cuban plane killing everyone on board, a crime that would have been outrageous if it was the other way around. But the Americans refuse to handover the terroroist who did the bombing..he lives free in Florida.

That's a difficult one, isn't it?

Of course it is wrong to kill innocent citizens. But as you say, JK, plenty of innocent Germans were killed in WW2, and if people hadn't fought and sometimes killed for their freedom throughout history, then no-one would have any rights apart from a privileged few. All you can do is use your judgement and conscience to assess each circumstance separately.

Should we be jailing people for inciting hatred and terrorism? My instinct says that sometimes we should, though I admit that is not something which sits very well with me. Personally, I'm delighted to see that Islamic fruit loop we were talking about on another thread sent down, but that belief stems from my personal opinions, so I am not necessarily right. I don't doubt that we are on the edge of a potentially slippery slope once those in power have the ability to jail people for voicing their beliefs. Where power can be abused, it usually is.

Essentially, I have used a lot of words to say "I don't know"

Anthony wrote:
Personally, I'm delighted to see that Islamic fruit loop we were talking about on another thread sent down, but that belief stems from my personal opinions, so I am not necessarily right.

Anthony

Think this way ... IF someone is talking rubbish - it will soon be apparent. Best thing is to let them spout on, and expose themselves.

If we need laws to ban things, then the "things" themselves will not stand-up to scrutiny, will they?
For example - the Jews have persuaded many countries to ban "denying" the holocaust. Why is this? When people deny the right to scrutinise something - they usually have something to conceal !

We probably need to start by looking at what terrorism really is. It is the waging of a war of terror, striking at the very heart of a society and spreading insecurity, where the next target is unpredictable and paople are caused to live in fear.

In the UK at present we are terrorised from two sides. The 'official' terrorists threaten to bomb us while our government perpetuate the fear by increasing their own powers and diminishing our freedoms to the extent that we have no idea where we stand or what will happen next.

Terrorism isn't necessarily about physically waging war against some other nation or regime. It is mostly psychological.

By this definition, the French resistence were not terrorists because they had a specific enemy and the ordinary people had little to fear from them. The Taliban in Afghanistan are, by this definition, no more engaged in terrorism than the British or American forces.

If we are to say that terrorism is the act of inflicting and spreading terror, then we must include government and media as much as those who are trying to kill us. Not all terrorists are killers. Not all killers are terrorists.

Overall, in my opinion, terrorism is a bad thing.

Too easy JC. I think we all agree that terrorism is a bad thing; killing people because of your own beliefs is wrong.

But those who indulge in it often genuinely believe they are fighting for the good.

Easy enough to poo poo silly "God" and faith reasons but how about those good Germans fighting Hitler as he rose to power. Those who saw the anti semitic and anti gay forces gaining control. When it slipped from bigotted ideas to gas chambers? Crystal night?

Those who now feel child killers and fundamentalist murderers should be executed are just one step further than those urging locking up paedophiles and Muslims. And those who believe if you can stop crimes before they are committed...

Mugabe was once a hero. Those Sinn Fein politicians once advocated killing innocent children. The line is easily crossed.

It's far from simple.

JC wrote:
We probably need to start by looking at what terrorism really is. It is the waging of a war of terror, striking at the very heart of a society and spreading insecurity, where the next target is unpredictable and paople are caused to live in fear.

Like firing a cruise missile from 300 miles away ?
Or dropping a bomb from a height of 30,000 feet ?

I don't recall saying it was easy or simple.

I think I even hinted at the opposite. I thought I made my points fairly clear, but maybe not.

In The Know wrote:

Think this way ... IF someone is talking rubbish - it will soon be apparent. Best thing is to let them spout on, and expose themselves.
Wise words, which mirror my normal way of thinking, but I am not so sure they apply where religious fanaticism is concerned. Islamofascists prey on vulnerable, disaffected people, who are only too willing to latch onto anything which gives them a purpose. Religion is a powerful drug to such people and it operates beyond the usual constraints of rationality.

Humans can normally pick out nutters if you give them enough rope to hang themselves, but religion seems exempt, otherwise how can such balderdash have survived in tact for so many centuries? When it is exploited to such extremes as the likes of Abu Izzadeen takes it, we have a genuine danger to society, and just maybe, there is for once an argument for that particular type of terror to be silenced.

JK2006 wrote:

Easy enough to poo poo silly "God" and faith reasons but how about those good Germans fighting Hitler as he rose to power. Those who saw the anti semitic and anti gay forces gaining control. When it slipped from bigotted ideas to gas chambers? Crystal night?

Those who now feel child killers and fundamentalist murderers should be executed are just one step further than those urging locking up paedophiles and Muslims.
Not sure I understand the second paragraph, JK. I would certainly advocate locking up paedophiles, assuming they are actively practicing paedophilia, but I am not one step away from wanting anyone to be executed. I don't see the connection.

I don't think anyone urges locking up Muslims, but if you're talking about Islamofascists, the argument is not so clear. I would say that something you, I, ITK, and most people who post on here have in common is a belief in fairness and justice, and a dislike of the establishment when it veers away from these values, as it increasingly too often does. We will always support the underdog. Islam, however, when taken to its extremes is just as anti-Semitic and anti-gay as Hitler ever was. It subjugates women, practices capital punishment in the most brutal forms, and stands for everything we stand against.

Does it make sense to apply our normal standards of tolerance to people who are so fundamentally intolerant?

JC wrote:
We probably need to start by looking at what terrorism really is. It is the waging of a war of terror, striking at the very heart of a society and spreading insecurity, where the next target is unpredictable and paople are caused to live in fear.

In the UK at present we are terrorised from two sides. The 'official' terrorists threaten to bomb us while our government perpetuate the fear by increasing their own powers and diminishing our freedoms to the extent that we have no idea where we stand or what will happen next.

Terrorism isn't necessarily about physically waging war against some other nation or regime. It is mostly psychological.

By this definition, the French resistence were not terrorists because they had a specific enemy and the ordinary people had little to fear from them. The Taliban in Afghanistan are, by this definition, no more engaged in terrorism than the British or American forces.

If we are to say that terrorism is the act of inflicting and spreading terror, then we must include government and media as much as those who are trying to kill us. Not all terrorists are killers. Not all killers are terrorists.

Overall, in my opinion, terrorism is a bad thing.
You reasoning shows a presumption that the French Resistance were in the right.

That you can/do is rather the point in a nutshell.

Anthony - it is indeed the degree that worries me.
Actively practising is the problem. Islamic extremists are surely no worse than Christian extemists? Locking up people who come close to the line or even killing people for similar reasons is when we must start worrying.

I think we are reaching that point.

But might that be wise? There must have been many in Germany when the mad exteme Nazis started smashing windows who said "we must stop this now". They probably advocated peaceful, democratic methods of protest, quite rightly and sensibly. They probably said, again rightly, if someone hates Jews or Gays - they are entitled to do so as long as they do not get violent or offensive. We are all allowed sensible or stupid tastes.

When does that start becoming dangerous?

When we start persecuting those without real reason - but (as with Hitler), it is difficult to anticipate without becoming oppressive ourselves.

So, should we lock up potential terrorists who just talk the talk but haven't yet walked the walk? Is smashing windows going too far?

This is the stage we have reached. And a very dangerous one it is too.

In my wealth of experience (I am now old)... I have noticed evil creeps in with stealth, it rarely explodes (and when it does people try to bolt the stable door and fail to notice creeping evil elsewhere).

That is my rather complex position. Are we over reacting and over legalising when we should be educating and protecting in a more intelligent way?

Or are we correctly anticipating trouble and rightly trying to cut it off before it takes over? And can that sometimes provoke greater cunning and ways of spreading evil?

It is very much a topic for intelligent debate and I suspect the answer is as complex as the question.

zooloo wrote:
You reasoning shows a presumption that the French Resistance were in the right.
[/quote]


No it doesn't. Whether they were in the right or not is beside the point. I said that they did not match that particular definition of terrorism because they had a specific target. Their target was the military force which had invaded their country. If we are to call all fighters terrorists then it renders the term invalid, or at least gives it new meaning. I'd be inclined to compare the French resistance to guerillas more than terrorists. You don't have to be in the right or the wrong to be either.

Anthony wrote:
We will always support the underdog. Islam, however, when taken to its extremes is just as anti-Semitic and anti-gay as Hitler ever was. It subjugates women, practices capital punishment in the most brutal forms, and stands for everything we stand against.


It's all a matter of degree, Anthony.
Jews were banned from even entering the UK for nearly four hundred years, and its only in the last 40 years that gays have stopped being persecuted.

Women still don't have equal pay (and its only today that plans have been announced to give women equal rights to the accession to the Monarchy).

These people are behind, yes - but not that far behind us?

JC wrote:
zooloo wrote:
You reasoning shows a presumption that the French Resistance were in the right.



No it doesn't. Whether they were in the right or not is beside the point. I said that they did not match that particular definition of terrorism because they had a specific target. Their target was the military force which had invaded their country. If we are to call all fighters terrorists then it renders the term invalid, or at least gives it new meaning. I'd be inclined to compare the French resistance to guerillas more than terrorists. You don't have to be in the right or the wrong to be either.[/quote]
The IRA specific target was the security forces for much the same reason you allow for the Resistance.

There's no record of the French resistance blowing up restaurants, shops or buses filled with civilians. Quite different to the IRA in my opinion.

JC wrote:
There's no record of the French resistance blowing up restaurants, shops or buses filled with civilians. Quite different to the IRA in my opinion.
I don't know that much about the Resistance but it seems likely bystanders were harmed on occasion.

The IRA usually gave warnings, the purpose of bombs was to cause disruption and kill the squaddie trying to defuse it.

I don't recollect the IRA targeted civilians as such, even if some were killed it wasn't the direct intention - unless they were what could be thought of as "collaborators".

Both groups were civilians fighting against a foreign army the only difference being is you think the French were ultimately more justified than the Irish.