Ottawa shooter wasn’t a terrorist: he was a troubled man
Blaming a foreign enemy for your own shortcomings has been a popular policy for governments since the dawn of governance.
Stephen Harper’s repetitious employment of the term ‘terrorist’ is to dissociate Michael Zehaf-Bibeau from the mainstream of non-radicalized, non-politically deviant young Canadians.
It’s far easier to cast someone as an outsider than address the cause of such deviance.
The term itself, “terrorist”, has undergone some sort of semantic evolution since 9/11. The practical definition has become so broadly ambiguous that it is often misapplied, willfully or otherwise, by governments, civilians and combatants alike.
If “terrorism” is defined as “the unofficial or unauthorized use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims”, then surely America’s drone wars would satisfy this definition.
The perpetrator in the Ottawa shootings was a crazed, troubled man who, so far, has only been proven to have had spurious links with terrorist organizations and cells.
Canada, along with many other countries including the U.S. and the U.K., must invest more money in treating the mentally ill and limiting the availability of firearms.
But most importantly, the West must create inclusive societies where migrant workers and their descendants do not feel excluded from an increasingly xenophobic, Islamophobic mainstream.
In his speech on Thursday, Harper reminded his compatriots that “Canada is not immune to the types of terrorist attacks that we have seen around the world.”
A rather overdue realization for a Prime Minister of a country who, as the headline of a Glenn Greenwald article this week told us, has been at war for thirteen years—yet was shocked when one of their soldiers was attacked.
Bandwagoning onto U.S.-led “anti-terror” crusades throughout the Middle East will inevitably provoke an eventual response.
Attacks such as these, he remarked, are attacks upon “our country, our society, our values … as a free and democratic people who embrace human dignity for all.”
Whilst everyone agrees that the Islamic State employs savage methods as they spread terror, dehumanizing your enemy gets you nowhere.
“Fight against the terrorist organizations who seek to brutalize those in other countries, with the hope of bringing their savagery to our shores,” implored Harper.
“They will have no safe haven,” he told us.
By implicitly juxtaposing the dual notions of the savagery of terrorist organizations and the presumed civility of the people of these shores, he simply dichotomizes, alienates and offers nothing.
Harper, the man who eloquently concluded his speech by remarking that “today has been without question, a difficult day,” has no new ideas. His only solution to the attacks in Quebec and Ottawa this week is to bandwagon the U.S. into a new war of neocolonial implication as Bush’s War on Terror undergoes a renaissance.
This is not a solution, but a call to arms. If Western governments continue to use the tragic passing of men like Corporal Cirillo or Fusilier Drummer Rigby as the rationale for an escalation of the “war on terror”, simply because their murderer may have muttered, or indeed screamed “Allah Akbar,” then it is a war they will never win. It will only serve to perpetuate itself.
The need for mental health funding is not new.. but if one was smart (which gov’s are not) they would abolish the firearms act entirely. It does no good at all but has actually COST LIVES.. not only in ht elitteral sense but also by way of the massive waste of resources (starting back in the 1930’s with handgun registration).
Now imagine if all of those wasted resources were instead focused on actual problems.. such as real criminals, lunatics etc etc.. that could have done GOOD for all of us in the end.
Stop blaming the inanimate object.. aka the firearm.. it is INANIMATE!
Focus on the actual problems
Yes, lets get rid of guns, the lot. Lets even ban hunting too outside of where it is essential and get guns out of our everyday world. Its inanimate until someone uses it to fire a bullet… I hope I focused on the actual problems throughout the rest of the article. But, hey.. Lets debate.
The main issue in gun control is the concept that “state actors” with guns = good and civilians with guns = bad.
That is the official United Nations stance (and lingo).
Problem is the vast majority of “gun deaths” in our world are from governments killing their own people- far greater than governments killing soldiers or even civilians of other nations they kill their OWN people.
R J Rummell comes to mind for a source, google together with democide and genocide.
The primary reason for “gun violence” is the same as the reason for violence- asymmetry of power. People with great power become tyrants, no matter of race, creed, religion,etc.
The solution is not to disarm the people and arm the government (cops/military) but rather to balance the two. It would also be nice if civilians/the people could be split into criminal elements vs the non violent masses (the UN and gun control types never do).
If you wish to disarm the people you must also disarm the state- of small arms.
Again, because of the asymmetry of power theory all states would need to disarm lest the armed become tyrants over the unarmed.
Nicely said IMO
” Its inanimate until someone uses it to fire a bullet..”
You obviously do not understand the meaning of “inanimate”
The someone is the possible problem in that statement (since there are valid GOOD reasons to shoot something).. not the firearm. Focus on the problem not the tool.
Yeah… limit the availability of firearms…… to who? The entire population? Surely passing laws banning or prohibiting most all firearms in a country will stop soldiers from being run over and killed.
Heck Britain proved that, just ask Lee Rigby.
IE pass all the laws you want banning firearms, violent killers will still be violent and still kill, suicidal persons will still commit suicide (see japan).
Address the mental health issue, address culture- why we focus on money and material rather than family, hobbies, and true happiness, address the reasons for hate, violence, and despair.
Sure, and I believe I made that point in the article (although I perhaps could have elaborated, but its tough in 600 words – that addressing mental health issues and using taxes to create larger welfare states as opposed to expanding your military industrial complex will help create a world where this is less likely to happen again
I think it is easier than that.
Perhaps address culture.
Countries that focus on money, things, and financial success tend to have higher suicide rates and exceptionally low levels of happiness (see Japan).
Countries that focus on “gross national happiness” tend to be happier, live longer, have more time with their family, raise their own kids (not the TV or a nanny), partake in hobbies and enjoy life- they have the longest lived peoples on Earth and few suicides.
This ignores “gun control” as a factor entirely.
As far as gun violence goes address violence, which IMO is attributed largely due to “hate”- derived from “us vs them” teachings in media or culture (religion vs religion, race vs race, rich vs poor, or government media demonization of a group- muslims, tutsi, jews, etc).
Lastly you have those who are violent by mental defect, in which case early diagnosis and treatment are needed.
“As far as gun violence goes address violence”
Remember there is no such thing as “gun violence” but simply violence period regardless of the tool(s) used..
Those that use terms like “gun violence” are again focusing on the wrong thing.. the gun does not cause violence at all ever. But the people using firearms or other tools ultimately are the cause of violence (justified or not depending on the situation/circumstances of course since there is “good violence” as well)
otherwise I agree w/your post 🙂
Yup.
In the end it is aggressive violence that is evil, defensive violence that is good.
So, in the case of an armed intruder breaking into a families house intent on raping and pillaging- gun control types would have the family disarmed to prevent a “gun death” letting the raping and pillaging occur. “If it saves just one life” seems all that matters even if it is the evil aggressor, the attacker, by denying the law abiding citizen their right to defensive violence.
The United Nations too feels this way at a macro level noting that if a government is killing its own people those people should still be disarmed, to die quickly, to prevent a “prolonged” conflict that could result in “greater gun violence and gun death”. Note that they refer to government forces taking lives of innocent civilians, cops or soldiers lives being taken is a big no-no, even though they are the aggressive attackers. Again the defensive violence of the victims is denied and deemed “evil” whist the violence of the state is deemed “good” (aka “legitimate”) irrespective of its aggressive or defensive nature- the state can kill anyone they want for any reason because they are the state (as deemed by the state’s judicial system etc- the state determines the “law”).
If you can fathom what I have said you will fathom the pro-gun ideology of self defense rights and why we are against civilian disarmament treaties in the United Nations (SALW Treaty, marking schemes, universal registration, etc).
It need not matter who the attacker is, they are always wrong. It need not matter who the defender is, they are always correct.
To ban violence one must merely ban aggression, those who make unprovoked attacks against others- be these individuals, gangs, cartels or even governments (!) “state actors”.
This is the solution to peace and the micro and macro level.
(how to do this is another thing- but banning guns from civilians is not the answer, and denying self defense to individuals is not either).
It is impossible to ban such.. it’s part of human nature.
What can be done however is to prepare properly and w/o the knee jerk BS like “gun control” for the eventuality of such events which will continue to happen regardless of idiotic laws.
Just a quick note, If you read what I wrote here you will see “nature vs nurture” being addressed WRT violence.
You made a point that in essence tries to focus on a non-existant problem and in doing so exacerbates a very real problem by wasting resources on the former instead of focusing on the latter.
Lots of big words used here and yet the writer says as little or less than what they suggests the PM said in is speech. What is a Terrorist? How about one who terrorizes or wishes to terrorize people… To say that the men responsible for the attacks on canadians recently are mentally ill but, despite their own admission and desires, are not terrorists is ridiculous. If they ARENT… who IS?
I find it amusing when one side spends so much time talking about how the other side is “doing nothing” when their own side is doing even less or, worse, doing what they can to dumb down the situation.
Terrorists told their followers to terrorize people in other countries and they did… so should we ignore the fact that the crazies ARE acting out while we search for a way to cure them of their craziness? Or should we look seriously at our system WHILE we do whatever is necessary to stop them AND the ones commissioning their heinous acts?
Luke, 1.4 billion Muslim’s in the world: collective responsibility for the atrocities committed by 20,000 IS fighters – radicalised in part through western imperialism – is seeming to become an evermore prevalent notion in western societies. Lets improve our social systems whilst not bandwagoning into new conflicts, which are the tangible legacy of interventions abroad, which insofar have only helped foster instability and fail states.
The problem is that of that 1.4 billion how many are standing up and actively condemning and helping to stop the actions of the 20,000? Not many.. and that in turn creates yet another problem.
It’s not helping themselves at all to remain silent.. that only helps the radicals
What is a Terrorist?
THIS
IF the masses could fathom this one question they would fathom so much……
Much of what is counter terrorism is in fact terrorism itself.
Much of what is done in the name of safety destroys democracy and freedom- the reaction to terrorism is what lets terrorism “win”.
Many of the free governments of the world use “terrorism” in their war on “terrorism”.
etc
The need for increased mental health funding is without question but has the writer forgotten W.O. Patrice Vincent? He was murdered by a deranged Islamist using a car. Perhaps Mattha Busby thinks we should limit the availability of cars? I am deeply offended by the focus of the media and others on one recent murder over another. Both W.O. Patrice Vincent and Cpl. Nathan Cirillo were proud members of our armed forces, both were family men and both were murdered by deluded young men who were drawn to a violent ideology. Perhaps if our government had used the money wasted on the gun registry for increased mental health programs this could have been prevented.
The point I was trying to make is that deranged Islamist or not Harper should not be so reactionary to view greater involvement in wars abroad – which are a product of western intervention – as the solution to what are largely social failings. But yes, I agree with you that increased funding for mental health programs is certainly what the govt need to do and perhaps they shall.
” I agree with you that increased funding for mental health programs is
certainly what the govt need to do and perhaps they shall.”
Now ask yourself.. if all of the resources wasted on “gun control” had been focused on mental health instead.. would we not be better off?
That is the fallacy of “gun control” in the first place which is perpetuated by morons like Cukier whom do nothing of real value for society and constantly grave dance in order to try to further their own agenda. Thereby harming society by wasting resources that could have been put to actual benefit for us all.