{"id":75288,"date":"2016-06-20T12:00:31","date_gmt":"2016-06-20T11:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=75288"},"modified":"2016-06-18T17:53:43","modified_gmt":"2016-06-18T16:53:43","slug":"why-is-the-killer-of-british-mp-jo-cox-not-being-called-a-terrorist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2016\/06\/why-is-the-killer-of-british-mp-jo-cox-not-being-called-a-terrorist\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Is the Killer of British MP Jo Cox Not Being Called a \u201cTerrorist\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Glenn-Greenwald-Original_350\"<\/a>17 Jun 2016 – <\/em>British Labour MP Jo Cox was brutally murdered yesterday. Although the motive is not yet proven, there is mounting evidence that the detained\u00a0suspect, 52-year-old white male Thomas Mair, was motivated by political ideology. Cox was an outspoken advocate for refugees. At least two witnesses say Mair, as he carried out the attack, yelled<\/a> \u201cBritain First,\u201d the name of a virulently right-wing anti-immigrant party<\/a>. He has years\u00a0of<\/a>\u00a0affiliation with neo-Nazi groups: what Southern Poverty Law Center describes as<\/a> \u201ca long history with white nationalism.\u201d The U.K. is in the midst of a bitter and virulent debate about whether to exit the EU \u2014 Cox opposed that \u2014\u00a0and much of the pro-Brexit case centers on\u00a0fear-mongering over immigrants.<\/p>\n

The #brexit<\/a> referendum has poisoned the country https:\/\/t.co\/fc2EpkGLzx<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Steve Loughran (@steveloughran) June 17, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

@LBC<\/a> @mrjamesob<\/a> Where does the hate and fear come from? pic.twitter.com\/RB2FcvEJQp<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Andrew (@DingersClapham) June 17, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Despite all of this, it\u2019s virtually impossible to find any media outlet calling the attacker a\u00a0\u201cterrorist\u201d or even suggesting that it might be\u00a0\u201cterrorism.\u201d To the contrary, the suspected killer \u2014 overnight \u2014 has been alternatively described as a gentle soul or a mentally ill \u201cloner\u201d:<\/p>\n

Both rags that did most to fuel an atmosphere of hate want you to know he was a ‘loner’ and no one else is to blame. pic.twitter.com\/UawOIduKdT<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Nooruddean (@BeardedGenius) June 17, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

The singularly sensitive way that the media treats violent white men is beyond clich\u00e9 at this point. pic.twitter.com\/fixp8lO5eo<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Reed F. Richardson (@reedfrich) June 17, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

This stands in stark contrast to a very similar incident that took place in the U.K. in 2010, when a British MP, Stephen Timms, was brutally stabbed and almost killed by a\u00a0woman\u00a0angry over his vote in support of the Iraq War. In that case, British media outlets almost uniformly called the attack \u201cterrorism\u201d;\u00a0The Guardian<\/em>, for instance, described it<\/a>\u00a0as \u201cthe first terrorist attack to injure someone on the U.K. mainland since 7 July 2005.\u201d The headline of the British tabloid Mirror<\/em><\/a> called the attacker a \u201cwoman terrorist.\u201d And just yesterday, another tabloid,\u00a0The Sun<\/em>, reported on Timms\u2019s comments about Cox <\/a>and, in its headline, referred to him as \u201cTerror Stab Survivor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Photo:<\/a>

Photo: Rex Features\/AP<\/p><\/div>\n

The difference is obvious: Timms\u2019s attacker was a Muslim of Bangladeshi descent, while Cox\u2019s alleged killer \u2026 is not. As I\u2019ve written repeatedly<\/a>, the word \u201cterrorism\u201d has no real concrete meaning and certainly no consistent application. In the West, functionally speaking, it\u2019s now a propaganda term with little meaning other than \u201ca Muslim who engages in violence against Westerners or their allies.\u201d It\u2019s even used for Muslims who attack soldiers of an army<\/a> occupying their country.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s certainly true that there are some suggestions that Mair \u2014 Cox\u2019s alleged killer \u2014\u00a0had struggles<\/a> with mental illness. But exactly the same was true<\/a> of Omar Mateen, who slaughtered 49 people in an Orlando LGBT club last week, and he was instantly decreed to be a \u201cterrorist\u201d<\/a> by essentially every media outlet despite those mental health issues and his obvious struggles with his own sexual orientation.<\/p>\n

Again, the difference is painfully obvious. As Reza Aslan put it today<\/a> about Mair: \u201cHe suffered from mental illness is now terror shorthand for \u2018he wasn\u2019t Muslim\u2019 \u2026 even if he was a fucking Nazi!\u201d At this point, it is not hyperbole to note that the real definition of these terms is best captured by this screen shot from Family Guy<\/em>:<\/p>\n

@ggreenwald<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/lr4uIeTxKK<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Ahmed Alfi (@AOAlfi) June 17, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Those who instantly and reflexively call Muslims \u201cterrorists\u201d struggled with how to process this latest attack. As\u00a0The Daily Mail<\/em>\u2019s Dan Hodges noted<\/a>, a Breitbart<\/em> writer indignantly complained<\/a>\u00a0just four days ago that the media were\u00a0refusing to assign collective guilt to Muslims for Mateen\u2019s attack and instead were blaming mental illness \u00a0\u2014 \u201cThe media are trying to spin that this was a \u2018lone wolf\u2019 attack by an unbalanced individual while ignoring the Islamic beliefs of the attacker\u201d \u2014 while another Breitbart<\/em> writer yesterday said exactly the opposite<\/a> about Cox\u2019s killer: \u201cAre we seriously being expected to believe that this act of violence by a deranged loner represents a statement on the political climate of Britain of\u00a0which we should all take note?\u201d As\u00a0The Guardian<\/em>\u2019s Hadley Freeman put it<\/a>:<\/p>\n

It really is something seeing the same people so quick to blame Islam for other killings cry now “We don’t know the motive! Mental illness!”<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Hadley Freeman (@HadleyFreeman) June 17, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, there was this stunningly illuminating\u00a0exchange on the Facebook page of Britain First:<\/p>\n

Did a lightbulb just go off on the Britain First Facebook page? pic.twitter.com\/a9nwWrtuxN<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014 Sunny Hundal (@sunny_hundal) June 16, 2016<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

To be very clear: I\u2019m glad when the media withhold judgment about a killer\u2019s motives or goals before there is sufficient evidence to know that with reasonable certainty. I have no particular objection to their refraining from applying the \u201cterrorist\u201d label to Cox\u2019s killer before more evidence is available. And, as I said, the term \u201cterrorist\u201d at this point has so little cogent meaning that debates about how to apply it seem quaint and completely academic. The scholars Remi Brulin and\u00a0Lisa Stampnitzky\u00a0have spent years documenting<\/a>\u00a0how the term, from the start, was little more than a propaganda tool<\/a> designed to legitimize one side\u2019s violence while delegitimizing its\u00a0enemies\u2019 violence.<\/p>\n

The issue is that this journalistic restraint is extremely selective. Does anyone have any doubt at all that if Cox\u2019s suspected killer\u00a0had been Muslim, yelling \u201cAllah Akbar\u201d instead of \u201cBritain First,\u201d then every media outlet on the planet would be describing him forever as a \u201cterrorist\u201d? The fact that they are not doing so here sheds great light into what this word really is.<\/p>\n

__________________________________<\/p>\n

Glenn Greenwald<\/a> – \u2709glenn.greenwald@theintercept.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theintercept.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The term now has little meaning other than \u201ca Muslim who engages in violence against Westerners or their allies.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-focus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75288","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=75288"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75288\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}