[happy character pointing at a painting of a french resistance fighter holding a molotov cocktail] Freedom fighters! Those people were heroes for fighting against oppression
[angry character shoving their smartphone in our face with a picture of a palestinian holding a rock] Evil terrorists! Those people are monsters for fighting against oppression
It’s only good when white people do it.
It always shocks me how the whole plot of Star Wars original trilogy (and now Andor) is “how the young people get radicalized into terroristic organization”. But somehow the clash with our international politics is never noticed, how we create exactly the same scenarios…
(Sorry, messy comment, I hope it makes sense)
Idk if I would say it was never noticed… The original trilogy is basically just an analog for the Vietnam war with the US being the bad guys.
So the Ewoks are Vietnamese? Woh
The difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter is only whose side you’re on
i think terrorist is when you attack random civilians for the purpose of inciting terror to further a political cause, like a suicide bomber on a city bus…
Not sure why they’re down voting you but you’re right
However, freedom fighters pretty much will have to resort to doing just that. You can’t meet a country on the battlefield, you’ll get wiped out, so you’ll have to resort to guerilla tactics, which terrorists also do.
The entire point of my post was to say exactly that; there is no difference between terrorists and Freedom fighters, except the side you’re on.
Terrorists usually fight for a cause. You may like and or support that cause without wanting to support terrorism, but if the cause is big and ornsire enough, terrorism may be the only way out. This includes attacking civilian targets, unfortunately. Reminds me of “star Trek, deep space nine” which had many episodes related to this, blurring the lines between who is “good” and who is “bad”. I highly recommend it, great great show (seasons 1&2 are mostly notably weaker, the rest is amazing)
Of course in the real world, lines get even more blurry very fast. Terrorist groups get funded by other states, that may add to or change the direction and rules these groups follow. Terrorist groups tend to splinter frequently as well, causing splinter cells that may have different goals. Freedom fighters many times start out with lofty goals but over time need funding for their struggles, so then resort to crime like drug trafficking or even kidnapping to support their cause.
Farc, in Colombia also officially fights for freedom but has done atrocious acts, including child murder. The US, as another example, has famously financially backed countless freedom fighter groups (including Osama bin Laden) which committed atrocious acts, and fought against other terrorist groups that simply wanted freedom
Of course the US will claim that the ones they backed were freedom fighters, and the ones they’re fighting are terrorists. War against terror! Except for the terror that we spread around!
Life is complicated
i agree with pretty much everything you say, but i do differ in that terrorism is actually more about tactics than the viewpoint….
like, if you hold an elementary school hostage with some demands to someone, that’s always terrorism…
also why israel are terrorists….
but controlling powers tend to call everyone terrorists.
the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act makes it “terrorism” to get a job at a slaughterhouse or other meat plant and secretly record video….
One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter
I once had someone attack me on Mastodon for the Palestine flag in my profile (next to the Ukraine one), telling me that “those people” would happily kill me too for being trans and whatnot. So I was obviously an indoctrinated idiot.
I still cringe about that selfish ignorance. As if a constant state of war and terror would enable anyone to be more open and progressive. As if a society that successfully eradicates another one would be like that either. It’s so phenomenally short-sighted.
At which point does our educational (and healthcare -> therapy) system fail to teach the simple fact that the only way to lasting peace and prosperity is to ensure safety, rights and wellbeing of even those who we may not like or who may not like us? Obviously a lot of people in this world would like to see me dead or incarcerated. But that wouldn’t change if I could suppress them, on the contrary.
We clearly still have a very long road ahead of us (if we survive as a species without destroying the planet first) to true enlightenment and peace.
One myth which rarely goes challenged is that there is a death penalty on trans or gay people in Palestine. They have a jail sentence for “public indencency” or the likes but even Hamas has never killed anyone for being gay.
This is not to say they are pro LGBT minded, just that they would not kill you.
Just google “bin laden freedom fighter”, it turns out he was both at different times…
“liberté, égalité, fraternité” you say ☞
The Reign of Terror (French: La Terreur, lit. ‘The Terror’) was a period of the French Revolution when, following the creation of the First Republic, a series of massacres and numerous public executions took place in response to the Federalist revolts, revolutionary fervour, anticlerical sentiment, and accusations of treason by the Committee of Public Safety. While terror was never formally instituted as a legal policy by the Convention, it was more often employed as a concept.
Transitioning from revolution to government is hard. It takes a very different kind of person to lead a successful revolution than to lead a democratic country.
