It’s not an unnecessary nitpick at all. The way the word is used today, it actually doesn’t have a meaning that you could write down. State sponsored acts of violence against another state has traditionally been described as war. The thing that blurs that particular line today is the blurriness between between agents of the state and private agents resourced by the state (as well as controversy around which states are legitimate states, and which governments are legitimate governments).
The reality of the situation today is that ‘terrorism’ doesn’t actually describe a definable act. Whether something is terrorism or not depends entirely on the political perspective of the person describing it. Destroying property, committing arson and tearing down statues as part of a political protest would be quintessential terrorism according to the actual definition of the word. But to describe it that way in our current political climate would be remarkably controversial. Whenever somebody calls something terrorism, all they’re doing is offering a political opinion. Which seems like a particularly relevant point to acknowledge in a discussion about what terrorism actually is.
One person's freedom fighter is another person's rebel; One person's soldier is another person's foreign invader... that's not a new concept? Didn't stop us from calling things wars, groups rebels or soldiers, and a whole host of other words for hostilities that all depend on your point of view.
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If you put something like a firecracker in a random mailbox and watch it blow up, it will scare people, but a limited number of people would consider that terrorism
If you go and put firecrackers in random mailboxes all around a city for a week, it will be called terrorism because there's an expectation there's some political or ideological objective someone is trying to meet with that fear.
No one knows for sure why you're doing it, maybe it's not terrorism, but it will be called terrorism because that's a logical conclusion. At some point in level of violence, or complexity, or damaged caused, people start to seek meaning past fear for fear's sake. This is why you see them use the word terrorism
If anything your hangup seems to be exactly that, people seeking meaning by calling it terrorism without some concrete objective being known to them, but it's common sense.
This was a sophisticated attack, a team of gunmen with scouted positions, communications lines cut, only very specific components being hit. What non-political motive can you come up with that out ranks some kind of geopolitical motive, or anti-government tilt? Even reasoning like "to wake up the government to the possibility" is political
How so? The surgical nature of the attack _combined with the most probable motives having a political tilt_ is what makes people call it a terrorist attack.
A sophisticated robbery of millions of dollars from a casino has a pretty clear motive that doesn't have to be political. That's not to say it couldn't be, but initial reports wouldn't call it terrorism since personal financial gain is a pretty good motive
Well, I extended upon my point in a consistent manner instead of weeble wobbling from one thing to the next while not really saying much, but that's an intended differentiation.
If you read it as a rephrasing that's ok too. Sometimes it's not a bad idea to rephrase a concept when someone has trouble understanding it.
The reality of the situation today is that ‘terrorism’ doesn’t actually describe a definable act. Whether something is terrorism or not depends entirely on the political perspective of the person describing it. Destroying property, committing arson and tearing down statues as part of a political protest would be quintessential terrorism according to the actual definition of the word. But to describe it that way in our current political climate would be remarkably controversial. Whenever somebody calls something terrorism, all they’re doing is offering a political opinion. Which seems like a particularly relevant point to acknowledge in a discussion about what terrorism actually is.