The New York Times\u2019 informs us that the words \u201cterrorism\u201d and \u201cterrorist\u201d have no clear, simple, universally agreed upon meaning. They are used as political weapons. When there\u2019s violence that we disapprove of, we call it \u201cterrorism.\u201d When we do approve of the violence, we find a nicer word to describe it.<\/p>\n
Wow! For thoughtful progressives, that\u2019s about as startling as an article informing us that the sun rises in the east, or that grass is green.<\/p>\n
What is startling is to see this obvious fact openly admitted on page one of the Times\u2019\u00a0 News of the Week in Review section, one of the most sacred sites of America\u2019s centrist mass media. The author, Scott Shane, is one of the Times\u2019 top journalists on the \u201cterrorism\u201d beat.<\/p>\n
He does offer a rough definition:\u00a0 \u201cTerrorism has come to be applied more commonly to the violent tactics of nonstate groups, often in a campaign of repeated attacks. The targets are often chosen for symbolic reasons (the World Trade Center, the Pentagon), and the victims usually include civilians. The acts of terror seek to influence an audience, ostensibly in service of a political goal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ironically, though, when I highlighted the word \u201cterrorism\u201d in the article, the Times website gave me a convenient little icon to click on to get this definition: \u201cThe unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nothing there about \u201cnonstate groups.\u201d\u00a0 By the Times\u2019 own definition, if a government is perpetrating violence in violation of international law, it\u2019s terrorism. Which only goes to show that Shane is right: No one can say for sure what counts as \u201cterrorism.\u201d It\u2019s all in the eye of the beholder.<\/p>\n
Is it possible, then, to say that the United States government could commit or support \u201cterrorism\u201d? Shane will not go that far, at least not directly. Yet he concludes by suggesting that Ronald Reagan was \u201cna\u00efve\u201d when he denied that the U.S.-backed contras in Nicaragua and jihadi \u201cfreedom fighters\u201d in Afghanistan were terrorists.<\/p>\n
With those words, Shane comes surprisingly close to questioning, if not breaking, the fundamental rule of America\u2019s mass media: Whatever those slippery words \u201cterrorism\u201d and \u201cterrorist\u201d may mean, they must never be applied to violence committed or paid for by the U.S. government.<\/p>\n
On the contrary, the rule says, the mass media must use those words to remind us that there are two very different kinds of violence, the good and the bad.\u00a0 As long as we believe in that difference, and assume that our own government\u2019s violence is the good kind, we can set our consciences at rest about the violence paid for by our tax dollars.<\/p>\n
Shane\u2019s article opens the door, just a crack, to calling the rule into question. Yet in his news articles, he himself has been using the words \u201cterrorism\u201d and \u201cterrorist\u201d as if they had specific, concrete definitions \u2014 the very illusion that his latest piece tries to unmask.<\/p>\n
For example, a recent article titled \u201cExperts Urge Keeping Two Options for Terror Trials,\u201d co-written by Shane, suggests that that the government would \u201chamstring itself by outlawing civilian terrorism trials\u201d and thus \u201ccreate major obstacles to swift punishment of terrorism suspects.\u201d<\/p>\n
The article assumes that we all know who and what we\u2019re talking about here: \u201cTerrorism\u201d is violence done against the U.S. or its interests.\u00a0 Virtually all articles in the mass media that use the words \u201cterrorism\u201d and \u201cterrorist\u201d assume the same.<\/p>\n
How long will it be until the Times stops using these slippery words in its news articles as if they had clearly defined meaning? How long until the Times, or some equally influential source, comes out and says that Reagan was not merely \u201cna\u00efve\u201d but outright lying when he denied that the U.S. supports \u201cterrorism\u201d?<\/p>\n
And how much longer will it be until the Times, or some equally influential source, says that not merely presidents past, but also the current inhabitant of the White House, can be guilty of the same verbal deception?<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t hold your breath. Nevertheless, it\u2019s encouraging to seee the Times taking a step in the right direction, no matter how small it may be.<\/p>\n
______________________ Whatever those slippery words \u201cterrorism\u201d and \u201cterrorist\u201d may mean, they must never be applied to violence committed or paid for by the U.S. government.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anglo-america"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nIra Chernus is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder. His Alternet blog focuses mainly on issues of U.S. national (in)security. Ira writes frequently for progressive websites, especially on Israel, Palestine, and the U.S. These columns are collected at http:\/\/chernus.wordpress.com<\/a>. His personal website is http:\/\/spot.colorado.edu\/~chernus<\/a>.<\/em>
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\nGO TO ORIGINAL \u2013 ALTERNET<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"