Terrorism – via Matt Good

There is simply no way to civilize murder. Many have attempted by claiming themselves, and their causes, noble, but if the end result is death in the name of that nobility then what is nobility besides a warped term co-opted by those with enough power to promote their own definition of it? If it is noble to forcefully inflict Western ideologies on others then it can be no less noble to die for ones beliefs to the contrary, no matter how radical or warped. Ultimately, if the murder of 3,000 people by a handful of radicals is an act of terrorism, then so is the murder of ten times that number at the hands of the worlds most sophisticated military power. In fact, Shock & Awe, which the United States based its Iraq strategy around, promotes the use of an immense display of military force to break the publics will. Now  how, exactly, is that not terrorism?

Terrorism is not a Middle Eastern phenomenon. It was, without question, perfected by White Europeans long before it became synonymous with the Islamic world. From Cortezs bloodbaths in Central America, to Stalinist Gulags, to the carpet bombing of North Vietnam and Cambodia, terrorism has always been a reliable tool that has served both totalitarian and democratic world powers alike (which might explain why its definition has been altered to focus on those ‘terror tactics’ that are radicalized rather than products of national policy).

Last night, while signing some things after the show, a fan, and member of New Yorks National Guard, informed me that a suicide attack in Iraq had killed in excess of sixty people. This morning, according to Reuters, yesterdays attack has now claimed the lives almost 100 Iraqis, injuring a further 150 plus. What can one say? This absolute madness will continue until we confront in ourselves the roots of this problem. But the person who told me about it best encapsulated our collective frustration when, after telling me, he hung his head and said we should have never have&