Terror attacks by Islamist groups

[Mugwump]

^ trolling level that one, sorry not worth engaging. Next.

[Pies4shaw]

It's come to something when a polite question is taking to be trolling.

[Mugwump]

It's come to something when a polite question is taking to be trolling.

It's come further when an implied Nazi slur is not even denied by you.

[Jezza]

^ I think that is part of the strategy here, Jezza. If we can grow desensitized to this, we can grow desensitised to simpler outrages against our values and decencies. Break down order and values, and create the sense that these things are semi-normal and to be implicitly accepted and tolerated, and you create the conditions for revolutionary change. It's the only route these people have to power. It has worked for them in the ME, and over time, it may well work here too. One has only to listen to the ebbing tide of useless and irresolute emoting that accompanies each outrage. People don't even bother to colour their Facebook page with the Turkish flag, nowadays.

That said, Turkey is a unique country in its exposure to IS and to Syria, and what happens there has a rather different set of roots to the outrages that happen in Western Europe. The same broad forces are probably at work, but the context is important.

In other interesting and reputably-sourced news, police in Koln arrested 92 people on NYE around the station. 16 were German. There is either a lot of prejudice involved, or the integration project has a long way to go. Germany used to be a very well-functioning society based on respect for rules, law and order. Oh well.

I think you are on the right track here. I can remember snippets of a pre-9/11 world, but I was only 7 years of age when 9/11 happened, without fully grasping the serious nature of the attacks and the ramifications that would occur after that.

I have grown up in an era where this has become commonplace and all too frequent, but I'd like to think that no decent country or civilisation will start to implicitly tolerate this barbaric violence, and at some point crackdowns will appear without necessarily curbing one's civil liberties.

I have read various articles online a few months back when the Brussels terror attacks occurred that suggest that global markets have become 'desensitised' to terrorist attacks as well, something that would have been unheard when 9/11 occurred.

Geopolitically, Turkey's role in the Syrian conflict is highly complex. They have been providing support to the Syrian opposition against the Assad regime and indirectly supporting ISIS in some areas of Syria by targeting the Kurds, which has been an ongoing conflict for decades. Plus, we're seeing Erdogan begin to Islamise public institutions in Turkey and drive a wedge between Turkey and it's secular roots as he emphasises on a Neo-Ottoman ideology.

It is well-known that Germany's project to import mass numbers of people, predominantly from the Middle East has had major issues and the backlash against Merkel and the EU has become evident in the past year. Although, Merkel still remains popular and on track to remain leader of Germany if latest polling trends are correct.

[Mugwump]

Yes, Jezza, we did enter a new world on 9/11 : a world where we can foresee any level of violence being used indiscriminately against us by an irrational and nihilistic enemy, whose agents are deeply embedded in our society. A world where the nation state is so weakened and porous that it can barely be mobilized to organize against the new type of menace. We are all still trying to make sense of the world in the light of that epoch-defining event.

On Merkel, I presume that she was animated by superficially good impulses, probably rooted in a misplaced desire to exculpate war guilt which has passed its statute of limitations. However, it has been act of astonishing political recklessness, unilaterally embroiling her European partners on the Mediterranean and Balkan front line in a wave of illegal immigration, emboldening the far right across the continent, exposing the German people and society to major and minor crime in a way which exceeded any democratic mandate, and putting at risk Germany's cultural and social fabric longer-term. If she is returned in the elections late next year it will be a testament, I suspect, to the lack of any credible true Conservative alternative, and the Germans' understandable paralysis in light of their history.

There were humanitarian alternatives to her recklessness and poor judgement. A policy of funding refugee camps and screening Syrian applicants in safe areas of Turkey, and then accepting those (especially families) who are genuinely and demonstrably Syrian refugees, might have filtered out the kind of passportless Tunisian who committed the Christmas market outrage. The Syrian people do need help, and we should be accepting more of them while doing more to assure their safety closer to home. If we can once again establish the line between asylum and illegal immigration, despite our home-grown revolutionaries who see it as a way to denature and destabilize their own societies, we may be in a position to do so.

<Further discussion on Germany's refugee policy moved here: http://magpies.net/nick/bb/viewtopic.ph ... 24#1743424 >

[think positive]

Bloody sad isn't it. I remember not so long ago my biggest fear on New Years Eve was some drunk taking out one of my kids. And now I have to worry if some lunatic is at the same event as them, ready with a gun or a bomb. Even going to the footy, the big shake down to get in the ground. I don't want my children to have to grow up with that kind if fear in their lives. Where does it end? War is something that happens in third world countries, surely in this day and age, and you'd think it would be close to getting stamped out by now. How the hell did we get to this?

The 9/11 memorial is much more than a couple of big pretty squares of waterfall. The museum underneath, built right where one tower stood, so you can still see bits of the actual building and the damage...... it's one of the most heart breaking things I have ever seen, heard, felt. And I pray that we never have such a memorial here.

As for bringing the Nazis into it, please don't. And may nothing ever be able to be compared to the sheer size, evil, torture, murder, that happened at that time in history.

If closing the door for a while, until proper checks can be completed, no matter how long that takes, well it has to be done. Surely the plight of Europe shows that. Surely you have a right to protect your own citizens, before helping others. (That doesn't mean you don't help them, it just means you have to do it slower, and more carefully) Something has to be done about a religious thing sect being able to brainwash its disciples into committing murder. And that's what it is. It's not war, it's not a fight for freedom, it's a fight for power. It's not racial, it's a bunch of 'normal' people using religion as an excuse to do evil.

As for the home grown terrorists, kick em out, or lock them up, no second chances. Shit heads like the Apex gang, zero tolerance. The judicial system in this country is far too lenient.

[Skids]

[watt price tully]

Dimitrious Gargasoulas... facebook post..Friday 6.44pm

.......

Why do the medua treat us like fools?!

Well let me see, hmmm

[Mugwump]

[stui magpie]

[David]

[think positive]

i reckon everyone fleeing that Mall thought it was an act of terror.
not every attack is a muslim terrorist attack.
a lunatic? all terrorist ravings are those of a lunatic,
religion is just an excuse, don't make it a valid one

[HAL]

Do you have any idea what I am talking about?

[David]

[Skids]