Shooting/Terrorism in Paris

[bobsaget77]

Originally Posted by Headache in a Suitcase

If we're so scared of a member of ISIS sneaking into the country, perhaps we shouldn't make it so easy to obtain weapons of death.

Trying to tie this back to gun control? Really? So we can be even more defenseless? And of course, ISIS won't find any other way to make or find a weapon.


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[cobl04]

Has there been one instance in American history where an armed citizen has shot a murderer and prevented more deaths? Genuine question, I don't know. But it seems like that's the logic of gun nuts.

[Kieran McConville]

None of us have any real influence over the course of events, but I think the average person could stand to inform themselves as much as possible about the recent and not-so-recent history in the Middle East (particularly the Syria/Iraq/Iran part of it). Not so much 'cliff notes' about Islam or whatever (which may shed some light, but only some), but the actual history on the ground. The factions involved. Information is power in that sense. I'd suggest looking for any reasonable non-axe-grinding university based Middle Eastern expert who maintains a good blog. Here's one (partially about ISIS, partly about Syria).

I'd also suggest turning off Facebook.

I don't necessarily say that specifically in connection with the massacre in Paris (some/all of them were locals, yes?), but coming to grips with the broader 'war on terror' and just what the heck is going on.

[Mack_Again]

Originally Posted by Axver

"nuke them all!"

well someone really loves Metallica

[cobl04]

Sure, but the thing is so fucking huge... I like to think of myself as reasonably switched on and I won't do the research because it is almost impossibly big to grasp. Where do you start, what to read, what political ideology is it trying to sell...

[bobsaget77]

Originally Posted by cobl04

Has there been one instance in American history where an armed citizen has shot a murderer and prevented more deaths? Genuine question, I don't know. But it seems like that's the logic of gun nuts.

Yes. It's happened many, many times. But it doesn't show up in the news because there wasn't a massive death total because the guy got shot.

http://controversialtimes.com/issues...uys-with-guns/

These are just a few instances.
Here's another one that happened recently in Texas.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/05/05/us/tex...shooting-hero/

Again. These are just a few examples
of something that happens quite a bit. Mass shootings don't occur because they get shot and killed. One or two people may die, but that won't be a national news story.


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[Kieran McConville]

Originally Posted by cobl04

Sure, but the thing is so fucking huge... I like to think of myself as reasonably switched on and I won't do the research because it is almost impossibly big to grasp. Where do you start, what to read, what political ideology is it trying to sell...

Well yes, I suppose, always be aware of what viewpoint someone is coming from, but while it's huge, it's not necessarily that huge.

[mama cass]

Originally Posted by bobsaget77

Trying to tie this back to gun control? Really? So we can be even more defenseless? And of course, ISIS won't find any other way to make or find a weapon.


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even more defenceless? do you not realise that your pro-gun laws have caused more deaths among US citizens than all the wars combined since WW2?

or does that seem the "safer" option to you?

[mama cass]

Originally Posted by Kieran McConville

None of us have any real influence over the course of events, but I think the average person could stand to inform themselves as much as possible about the recent and not-so-recent history in the Middle East (particularly the Syria/Iraq/Iran part of it). Not so much 'cliff notes' about Islam or whatever (which may shed some light, but only some), but the actual history on the ground. The factions involved. Information is power in that sense. I'd suggest looking for any reasonable non-axe-grinding university based Middle Eastern expert who maintains a good blog. Here's one (partially about ISIS, partly about Syria).

I'd also suggest turning off Facebook.

I don't necessarily say that specifically in connection with the massacre in Paris (some/all of them were locals, yes?), but coming to grips with the broader 'war on terror' and just what the heck is going on.

the situation is a mess... let's not forget who started arming IS against Assad in the first place...

if only we could know the consequences of our actions... this meddling probably goes back to Reagan and Thatcher etc. supporting Bin Laden back in the 80s...

and yep (apart from the one guy possibly linked to the Syrian passport - could always be a fake to deliberately cause a shit storm and polarize people even more), so far the attackers have been identified as French and Belgian nationals... young people who have been radicalized... there are thought to be approx. 500 French nationals operating as jihadi in Syria at the moment

[nbelcik]

Originally Posted by bobsaget77

Yes. It's happened many, many times. But it doesn't show up in the news because there wasn't a massive death total because the guy got shot.

http://controversialtimes.com/issues...uys-with-guns/

These are just a few instances.
Here's another one that happened recently in Texas.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/05/05/us/tex...shooting-hero/

Again. These are just a few examples
of something that happens quite a bit. Mass shootings don't occur because they get shot and killed. One or two people may die, but that won't be a national news story.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/10/26...tasy.html?_r=0

"The more that sensational gun violence afflicts the nation, the more that the myth of the vigilant citizen packing a legally permitted concealed weapon, fully prepared to stop the next mass shooter in his tracks, is promoted.

This foolhardy notion of quick-draw resistance, however, is dramatically contradicted by a research project showing that, since 2007, at least 763 people have been killed in 579 shootings that did not involve self-defense. Tellingly, the vast majority of these concealed-carry, licensed shooters killed themselves or others rather than taking down a perpetrator.

The death toll includes 29 mass killings of three or more people by concealed carry shooters who took 139 lives; 17 police officers shot to death, and — in the ultimate contradiction of concealed carry as a personal safety factor — 223 suicides. Compared with the 579 non-self-defense, concealed-carry shootings, there were only 21 cases in which self-defense was determined to be a factor."



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[mama cass]

Originally Posted by bobsaget77

Mass shootings don't occur because they get shot and killed. One or two people may die, but that won't be a national news story.

LOL

in which parallel universe is this?

[mama cass]

good article

The French are mourning, but by sticking together we can overcome | Natalie Nougayrède | Comment is free | The Guardian

Paris this weekend was a city wounded, stunned, still in shock, but also full of dignity. In the district where most of the attacks occurred, the lively 10th and 11th arrondissements, so mixed, so full of different communities, cafes, restaurants, shops for the middle classes, students, young families, areas sometimes described as “bobo-land” (for bourgeois-bohème) because they offer that mix of easy going joie de vivre and creativity, it was almost hard to believe a calamity had struck. There was radiant sun and Paris was beautiful, as ever.

One sign said it all perhaps: the drawing of the peace symbol, with the Eiffel tower in the middle, printed out and posted on shop windows.

Spontaneous gatherings took place in cities across France, candles were lit, flowers placed, notes written and symbols of peace drawn, and some sang the Marseillaise, the national anthem. Mass demonstrations are, for the moment, officially banned because of the state of emergency. The huge popular outpouring on to the streets that followed the Charlie Hebdo and kosher supermarket tragedies of January is impossible, but the need for unity is on everyone’s mind. French people have also been extremely sensitive to the gestures of solidarity shown from across the world, with the colours of the French flag shining on buildings and monuments, from Sydney to New York. There is hardly anyone who feels we are alone in this - so many emails and text messages have been received from abroad.

But soon, the funerals will start. Everyone will see the aggrieved, tortured faces of people who lost loved ones. Music will be played, homilies spoken. The trauma is far from over. There have been 129 people killed, and 99 severely wounded. Behind those statistics, there are lives, dreams, hopes, crushed. Those targeted were not well known cartoonists who carried the culture of France’s post-1968 generation, but anyone and everyone, of any origin, faith and activity: it was a strike at our society as a whole, a strike at our collective identity.

One thing needs to be said from the outset: Islamic State was bound to attack France, whether the French army carried out air strikes in Syria, or not. The complexity of Friday’s attack points to a long-prepared operation, whose conception very likely predated the start of French strikes against Isis in Syria, six weeks ago. They involved Isis cells present in different European countries, including Belgium and Germany, as the early results of the ongoing investigation indicate. It is difficult to believe that the hell that broke out in the heart of the French capital took just a few weeks to orchestrate.

But the deeper reason is that Isis had put itself on a war footing with France long before François Hollande ordered those strikes in Syria. It warned much earlier this year that it would intensify its campaign, and French officials say several attacks were thwarted in recent months. As a cult, as a fanatical entity, Isis needs to continuously increase both its reach and the objectives it sets itself. As long as it appears to be a “winner”, young people, indoctrinated, disenfranchised, lost in their minds, will seek to join it. The success of its recruitment, of its propaganda, depends on the success it can claim in a stream of assaults. France is seen as a weak spot partly because of the Charlie Hebdo precedent and because of questions over its capacity to reconcile its republican institutions with integrating a Muslim community.

Paris has been, and it is horrible to say, a great success for Isis, if only in operational terms. These attacks were a unique combination of different terror strategies: the 2008 assault in Mumbai, simultaneously targeting different sites in the same city, the 2002 hostage taking and carnage in a Moscow theatre (note the parallels with the atrocity at the Bataclan concert venue) and suicide bombings of the sort seen in Iraq, Afghanistan or Israel.

Isis created a war scene in Paris because it wants two things. It wants to fracture our society by making the coexistence of communities impossible, and I believe it wants to attract French retaliation in the form of deeper military engagement in Syria (in a de facto alliance with Assad) or in the form of a security policy that will feed resentment among its Muslim population. These are the traps it has set up.

Why does Isis want this? Because, again, those outcomes are the most powerful recruiting tools it will ever find in France and beyond. Isis is a cult whose overarching goal is to grow itself: destruction, for the sole purpose of conquering of minds and territories, is what it is all about. It is megalomaniac and nihilist. It hates our way of life, first and foremost. The statement it produced as it claimed responsibility for Paris makes that obvious with its reference to the Bataclan theatre as a place of “perversity”.

It’s also important to step back and look at where all of this, ultimately, comes from in the Middle East. The most dramatic fallout from the 2003 Iraq war is that it unleashed a sectarian conflict between Sunni and Shia. This has led to the complete unravelling of the Middle East as we knew it, with a huge human toll. But now that more than a decade has passed, it is hard to say that the policies of western governments are to blame for the existence of Isis. The organisation appeared in Iraq in 2014 as a reaction to the Shia-dominated Maliki government that was violently oppressive to Sunnis. So Isis is about a war of religion in the Middle East – no doubt unleashed after Shia Iran was able to entrench its influence in Iraq, post-Saddam.

But this is a backdrop that the west, once that Pandora’s box was opened, had very little leverage over. The US withdrawal from Iraq predated the rise of Isis and, to a certain extent, allowed it to take over Mosul in June 2014 - its first major military advance. Isis then grew in Syria because it cast itself as (supposedly) the sole, or most radical, protector of Sunni communities against the war machine of the Assad regime. This is why the Syrian civil war - the violence unleashed by a dictator against his own population and the radicalisation it has produced - has become the central tenet of the Isis phenomenon. Young European Muslims recruited by Isis believe, in their naivety, that they are travelling for something akin to humanitarian purposes. It is also largely because of this war that Europe is dealing with an unprecedented inflow of refugees.

So France, like the rest of Europe, stands now at a crossroads. The danger is already visible from statements made by the far right blaming Muslims as a whole, or war refugees streaming into Europe, for the Paris attacks. Marine Le Pen called for a closure of French borders immediately. She has her eye on regional elections next month. (This timing, by the way, points to another question: might Isis have chosen to strike now because it has that electoral calendar in mind?)

France harbours the largest and possibly best-funded extreme-right party in Europe, and it also has the largest Muslim population in Europe. It has lived through social tensions and crises of identity, revolving mainly around “laicité”, France’s particular model of secularism, high unemployment, inequality and racial discrimination in the workforce, in housing and elsewhere. This makes it essential for the right messages to be sent out by the government at such a crucial moment. François Hollande will address both chambers of parliament tomorrow. Will he find the words needed to consolidate a national sense of togetherness beyond cultural, social and religious fractures? After Charlie Hebdo, it took several days for French elites – and the media - to realise that many of the Muslim youth of the banlieues had utterly rejected the “Je suis Charlie” slogan, and that’s why they were absent from the huge 11 January demonstrations. Much has been done since then, including in schools, lycees, and in coverage by public broadcasters, to reach out to those communities and try to better make the case for the French republican model. It is early days now to say how French social cohesion will be affected by the bloodbath of 13 November, but it can be argued that this is the most worrying thing to watch. Talk of “a state of war”, or of “civil war” in France, after these attacks, is now the most toxic choice that could be made, because it risks giving Muslim communities the impression they are conflated with terror and fanaticism.

On the foreign policy level, one positive important gesture was the welcome for the Tunisian president at the Elysée Palace shortly after the attacks, a strong symbol of unity between those who are confronted with jihadist violence in Europe and in the Arab world. Tunisia is the only Arab Spring country where democracy has taken root, and democracy is what Isis wants to destroy. But a disgusting thing also happened: Assad was interviewed on French TV saying what Paris had suffered was what his country suffers from. The dictator’s lie, that negation and complete distortion of what he has put his own country through, and now us, indirectly, must be exposed and condemned. After the refugee crisis and now this tragedy in our midst, Parisians and Europeans will increasingly come to grips with the fact that Middle Eastern woes are not a distant far-flung problem, but our woes too.

The nightmare that continues in the Middle East, where Isis is trying to build its caliphate, and where civilians are massacred by Assad’s army – a grotesque unspoken alliance that has turned the region into a factory of despair spewing its consequences into Europe – is key, of course, to the events of Friday. But the danger that we face lurks also, in many ways, inside our own frailties, within the fragile fabric of French society – here I mention my country because it has just been assaulted – but this concerns all other democracies in Europe and elsewhere.

How we react to this horror will define who we are, how we defend ourselves and how we can help others defend themselves from the terror and hatred, the death and the disorder that Isis wants to sow.

We are mourning, as a French nation, as Europeans, as citizens of liberal democracies. But if we preserve the cohesion of our plural, diverse, rule-based societies – which, after all, was the number one target of the attackers – much can be overcome. I believe we can overcome.

[Kieran McConville]

Another facet of the larger story:

We must call to account the Saudi kings—Salman, Abdullah, and Fahd—whose funding of Wahhabi doctrine gave rise to the scourge of Islamic extremism.

When I was a child in Morocco, no clerics told me what to do, what to read or not read, what to believe, what to wear. And if they did, I was free not to listen. Faith was more than its conspicuous manifestations. But things began to change in the 1980s. It was the height of the Cold War and Arab tyrants saw an opportunity: They could hold on to power indefinitely by repressing the dissidents in their midst—most of them secular leftists—and by encouraging the religious right wing, with tacit or overt approval from the United States and other Western allies. Into the void created by the decimation of the Arab world’s secular left, the Wahhabis stepped in, with almost unlimited financial resources. Wahhabi ideas spread throughout the region not because they have any merit—they don’t—but because they were and remain well funded. We cannot defeat ISIS without defeating the Wahhabi theology that birthed it. And to do so would require spending as much effort and money in defending liberal ideas.

To Defeat ISIS, We Must Call Both Western and Muslim Leaders to Account | The Nation

The Saudi dynasty and the ultra-puritan, ultra-literalist, anti-intellectual Wahabbi school of thought (and people say Islam hasn't had a Reformation) have been locked in a mutual support pact since the eighteenth century.

All of these swirling currents would be bad, but they might not be fatal, if Iraq, and now Syria, were not mortally weakened.

[Vlad n U 2]

Nougayrede comes across as unbearable even when she finally makes a halfway decent point.

The Nation article was very good though.

[mama cass]

Originally Posted by Vlad n U 2

Nougayrede comes across as unbearable even when she finally makes a halfway decent point.

ouch Vlad, that was harsh

Originally Posted by Vlad n U 2

The Nation article was very good though.

brings to mind the revolution in Iran, which was hijacked by the clerics...

[Mack_Again]

I am weird i post duplicates.

[Vlad n U 2]

Sorry, but I generally view Nougayrede as being pretty clueless at the best of times, which is shown effectively in the facial expression The Guardian chose for her columns.

[mama cass]

I'm not familiar with The Nation - can someone give me some background on this publication? some of the articles look really interesting!

[Mack_Again]

Originally Posted by mama cass

LOL

in which parallel universe is this?

In the universe where every one thinks like Ben Carson? maybe?

[Vlad n U 2]

Everything I've seen from them has a pretty noticeable progressive bent (and plenty I've agreed with), so I'd say they are one of the better publications out there. Preferable to The Guardian for me at this point.