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Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

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Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#41

Post by 19eightyfour »

saurik wrote: post #25
19eightyfour wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you believe the propagation of narratives that try to justify illegal terrorist violence help support terrorists? I agree with that idea. And following from that basis, suppressing and/or countering such narratives is correct.

> Do you disagree with the idea that the propagation of narratives that pretend to support illegal terrorist violence does not actually help support terrorists? I agree with that idea. Either you added one too many negations or I am failing to understand your point... you are saying that the idea you agree with is that the propagation of narratives does not actually help support terrorists?

I probably added one too many negations. I confused myself when writing it! let me see if I can work it out.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#42

Post by 19eightyfour »

rl3 wrote: post #21
19eightyfour wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you believe the propagation of narratives that try to justify illegal terrorist violence help support terrorists? I agree with that idea. And following from that basis, suppressing and/or countering such narratives is correct.

> ... the propagation of narratives that pretend to support illegal terrorist violence ... As opposed to legal terrorist violence?

The idea is to reinforce the fact that:

- only the State has a monopoly on violence, so State violence is legal

- terrorist violence is illegal

Perhaps it would be clearer to say, the always-illegal terrorist violence...but that seems like too many words. I'm happy with it as it is.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#43

Post by aaron-lebo »

efdee wrote: post #31
nils-m-holm wrote: post #8

Communicate. Really, "terrorists" usually have the same goals as "we" do: peace, respect, safety, prosperity. If we stopped pretending that "we" are right and "they" are wrong, the problem might go away in the long run. Note that I do not approve of the terrorist approach to communication but, maybe, they just have no other way of making themselves heard, so if we listened, they might start talking instead of bombing…

This might be valid for a very limited subset of terrorists, but the kinds we are seeing today (IS, Boko Haram, ...) do not have these goals. Their main goals are the eradication of dissenters and the collecting of power over others. If you blow up people waiting in line in an airport, going to a concert, or visiting a nightclub, you are dead wrong. There is not much wiggle room here. If everyone who feels they are d…

Yeah if your goal is really peace and safety, maybe going around blowing innocents up isn't such a great way of achieving that.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#44

Post by [deleted] »

badosu wrote: post #36
avaer wrote: post #7

This post makes it seem like Facebook subscribes to the theory that hiding unpleasant content prevents terrorism, and that there is universal global agreement on what counts as terrorism. Is there any scientific literature that supports this? The post seems to treat it as a foregone conclusion and declares war on that basis, but I would love to see the research before deciding whether I agree with what they're doing.

> This post makes it seem like Facebook subscribes to the theory that hiding unpleasant content prevents terrorism, and that there is universal global agreement on what counts as terrorism. Terrorism is a label that is applied to any violent attack performed by (most of the time) non-state agents these days, where it should instead be used on situations where the perpetrator's intent is to instill fear on the populat…

[deleted]

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#45

Post by boomboomsubban »

efdee wrote: post #31
nils-m-holm wrote: post #8

Communicate. Really, "terrorists" usually have the same goals as "we" do: peace, respect, safety, prosperity. If we stopped pretending that "we" are right and "they" are wrong, the problem might go away in the long run. Note that I do not approve of the terrorist approach to communication but, maybe, they just have no other way of making themselves heard, so if we listened, they might start talking instead of bombing…

This might be valid for a very limited subset of terrorists, but the kinds we are seeing today (IS, Boko Haram, ...) do not have these goals. Their main goals are the eradication of dissenters and the collecting of power over others. If you blow up people waiting in line in an airport, going to a concert, or visiting a nightclub, you are dead wrong. There is not much wiggle room here. If everyone who feels they are d…

>If everyone who feels they are don't have a way of making themselves heard (whether or not that thought is valid) just starts harming unrelated people, we can just do away with society completely.

So... The US starts the Iraq War, thousands die, society goes away completely, and then ISIS show up? These groups didn't just decide to start these campaigns, their lives got progressively worse and they sought something that might improve it.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#46

Post by collyw »

im3w1l wrote: post #4

Terrorism is better than a police state. That said, hopefully "extreme vetting" will make the choice unnecessary.

Surely that depends on the extent of the police state and the amount of terrorism. I am guessing that some police states would be preferable to places in Syria right now.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#47

Post by 19eightyfour »

cbanek wrote: post #16
19eightyfour wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you even promote that? Even taken at face value...on the one hand, you have illegal violence carried out by non-state actors. On the other hand legal violence carried out by the state. Unless I totally misunderstood you, you are saying being subject to illegal violence carried out by non-state actors is better than police violence? No. Way. Societies worldwide would also disagree with you. The State has a mon…

I don't know if the comment was comparing state sanctioned violence vs non-state sanctioned violence, but a quote comes to mind: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Basically, if we wanted to eliminate terrorism, we would have severely curtail freedom. And there aren't nearly as many terrorists as people think. More people die from ca…

Oh, so you're saying the speaker was saying

" some terrorism as opposed to the curtailing of freedoms that would come from eliminating" [1]

is preferable ?

I completely took it to mean: "I would prefer to live in the Islamic State, than in the USA with mass surveillance."

Okay, well I'm undecided as to whether [1] would be preferable or not in the way it's phrased. What I have thought about tho is:

- Yes we could eliminate terrorism, and it would take a lot of extreme measures ( that the West would be unlikely to get away with )

- But why should we eliminate terrorism, since from a purely political standpoint, it is quite useful. From any sufficiently emotive or divisive issue political motivation and utility can be extracted. For instance, the fear of terrorism helps the State advance legislation that it probably would not be talking about if we did not have terrorism. So the funny paradox I see is that, at this stage of human development, our States can actually benefit from using the spectre of terrorism to develop and advance themselves. Please take this in no way to mean justifying terrorism in any way...just to say that, IMHO, real politik dictates that terrorism has political benefits for the very State it is supposed to politically disadvantage.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#48

Post by boomboomsubban »

rimliu wrote: post #14
nils-m-holm wrote: post #8

Communicate. Really, "terrorists" usually have the same goals as "we" do: peace, respect, safety, prosperity. If we stopped pretending that "we" are right and "they" are wrong, the problem might go away in the long run. Note that I do not approve of the terrorist approach to communication but, maybe, they just have no other way of making themselves heard, so if we listened, they might start talking instead of bombing…

Maybe you are right if you talk about "terrorists"—in quotes. However, if you talk about terrorists, or do be precises—jihadists, you are very far off base. Pretending that "they" and "we" share the same worldview won't cause the problem go away for sure. Because the problem is that they do think their way is the right way to live and what's worse—that all others, even those, who do not subscribe to their worldview s…

So, the US think their way is the right way, invade their country over it, and force anyone who doesn't subscribe to that view to follow it. Look how angry them doing that makes you, that's a fraction of what they feel.

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#49

Post by 19eightyfour »

xiaoma wrote: post #18
19eightyfour wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you even promote that? Even taken at face value...on the one hand, you have illegal violence carried out by non-state actors. On the other hand legal violence carried out by the state. Unless I totally misunderstood you, you are saying being subject to illegal violence carried out by non-state actors is better than police violence? No. Way. Societies worldwide would also disagree with you. The State has a mon…

Police states are pretty bad, too. Consider this: Would you rather live in a European country where terrorist attacks happen on a semi-regular basis and are in the news, or would you prefer North Korea where the state is very strong and terrorism is unheard of?

Okay, but that's unfairly ( to police States ) correlating lack of economic development with with increased State power. A more realistic comparison is: would you rather live in London, or Hong Kong ( or even better, Singapore )? ( terrorism is rare in HK, which is basically a police state protectorate of China, and SG is almost certainly a police state ).

You could just as easily say Paris v Warsaw, or Berlin v Shanghai.

TL;DR - comparison with NK is unfair since NK is very hostile to all foreigners and has few attractive economic reasons to live there, it doesn't offer much to potential expats / migrants. But Warsaw or China or HK, or SG have strong policies that seem to have stifled terrorism ( for now ). The fear of "police state == (NK or Burma)" is overblown. You can have strong policies and still have many attractive qualities.

Sorry, I feel the above isn't very clear, but it's the best I could do right now. Thanks

Re: Hard Questions: How We Counter Terrorism

#50

Post by 19eightyfour »

im3w1l wrote: post #15
19eightyfour wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you even promote that? Even taken at face value...on the one hand, you have illegal violence carried out by non-state actors. On the other hand legal violence carried out by the state. Unless I totally misunderstood you, you are saying being subject to illegal violence carried out by non-state actors is better than police violence? No. Way. Societies worldwide would also disagree with you. The State has a mon…

I think we should try to stop terrorism, but not "at any cost". Using AI model's to monitor all 1-1 conversations in the world is too dangerous of a power - it increases the risk for tyrany much more than it decreases the risk of terrorism.

I haven't thought much about this....But my first reaction is -- can we at least test it to see what happens?

I have something that might not be that relevant. Consider China's control of conversations on Weibo as a microcosm of "all 1-1 conversations". Assume they are using some sort of AI there ( there's a good argument for any sufficiently large bureaucracy being AI-like ). Is it really so bad? They've tracked huge GDP growth for 70 years and very low civil conflict, and much harmony, I think, from some points of view, definitely.

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