Pick your debate - 4/5 topics

Thanks Vi. Pro seems to accept that terrorism can include (in her words) "the struggle of people for determination, or revolution, or rebellion" as well as that "Occasionally it can even be the most practical [but never reasonable] way to achieve such ends." In any case she has not disputed these assertions. I think these are potentially strong justifications for terrorism in response to extreme oppression. I said: "Terrorism can include these things" [ as listed by Vi "fear mongering, propaganda, kidnapping and murder" ] "but it no more implies or necessarily includes any of them than it does the struggle for rebellion." Vi said: "As we can see, the definition of terrorism directly contradicts this. Terrorism either directly puts innocent people in harms way or disregards their safety completely." I don't see the contradiction here and I think my response to Vi's emotive opening argument still stands. ____ Pro:"my opponent assumes that if someone can irrationally talk themselves into justifying immoral behavior, it must be ok. I can talk myself into believing that dragons exist, but real evidence points to the contrary." "For something to be justified, it must be objectively just - it can not be only "interpreted" as just by a mind. Minds reason through things irrationally all of the time. It would not be immoral to rape an innocent woman if we threw the term "justified" as a subjective term that the perpetrator can use in any way he pleases to call his action "just." Also, you do not need to be clinically "insane" in order to commit an immoral and unjust act." The last thing I want to do is make this a debate based off semantics but I think there is a clear distinction between something being inherently and objectively just and something being able to be logically justified to a rational (if misinformed) mind. I think the use of the verb in the resolution makes this implication, otherwise the resolution would be "terrorism can never be just" or "terrorism is always unjust". I don't think it can be compared to rape because I don't see how that could rationally be defended on ideological grounds. Perhaps if a group of militant lesbians were to target known serial rapists and subject them to hideous forced anal violations, then maybe rape could be justified. I'm sorry for the confusion as well about the issue of rationality. I'm not arguing about justifying something to the insane or the irrational, that was my point. I'm talking about the rare instances where a rational person can make a clear minded decision that an act of violence is likely to bring greater benefit and more long term peace and that the ultimate loss of innocent life will be less in the long term because of it. Suppose that a group of German terrorists had been able to plant a bomb in Hitler's home during the first months of World War II. If they were willing to harm his family and his live-in house staff in order to carry out such an attack then it would qualify as terrorism rather than mere assassination. Such an act would be inexcusable if taken on its own but viewed in the wider context of the harm this man was intent on inflicting, I would consider this justifiable. Or imagine that you are an ANC or IRA activist planting a device within a military compound. These soldiers have been oppressing you and your people in your own land for decades and you are making a just strike back at them. You can justify the non-combatant casualties because in the case of the trainees, these will soon become hostile soldiers themselves and even the catering and cleaning staff are oiling the machinery for the regime of oppression. These are all realistic, historical examples of times when terrorism could have been justified, it would be all too easy to back up my argument further with hypothetical extreme circumstances where the justification would be even stronger. ______ "Killing of innocent people is never just. Taking an innocent life is always immoral and unjust, no matter the circumstances. One may say it is for the greater good - and yes, greater good may come from it, but it does not negate the immoral and unequal treatment of that life taken." I agree that taking innocent lives is always wrong but as I have shown above, in some situations it can be justified such as if the benefit (innocent lives saved) outweighs the cost (innocent lives taken). I would also point out that the definition of terrorism does not specify targeting or disregarding the safety of "the innocent" but rather of "non-combatants". While I am not suggesting that medical or administrative military personnel should be legitimate targets, I don't think they can be described as "innocent" in the same way as for example, a baby can. There are surely many individuals not bearing arms who are culpable for acts deserving punishment, such as politicians who vote in favour of an unjust war. Sorry about this but: Suppose that someone murders your entire family and everyone you love in front of you. You try to get justice through the courts but the murderer has a bunch of respectable cronies who all give him a watertight alibi (even though they know he did it) and he is found innocent. You are filled with justified murderous rage and your only hope is to extract revenge yourself. One day your opportunity to destroy him finally comes (after decades of seething in prison with everyone thinking that you murdered your loved ones yourself) but it will also involve murdering two of the guys that gave him an alibi. Now if they were truly innocent you probably wouldn't feel right doing it, but are they? Just because they didn't do the killing themselves? I think you'd be justified to take all three of them down. Maybe. _______ I am glad to know that my opponent does not exclude acts of war from the definition of terrorism. I couldn't be sure from her previous argument where she seemed to place great emphasis on the distinctions between them. She states that "It doesn't matter which wars I believe were just or not" but as I was asserting that virtually all wars inevitably lead to some disregard for the safety of non-combatants I think this is an important point. Unless my opponent is willing to also condemn the vast majority of wars this century (I would like to be knowledgeable enough to say "all") then her insistence that taking innocent lives is unjust holds little weight. Once again any source detailing a war with zero non-combatant casualties would be very much welcomed. My opponent has condemned as terrorism the fire-bombing of German cities, the atomic bombings in Japan and America's 'shock and awe' tactics in Iraq. I'm sure that many members of this site will view at least one of these occurrences as justified within the wider picture of events at the time. The issue of Hiroshima is a debate in itself but this essay starts with the arguments against it before justifying it within the historical context. http://docs.google.com... The site I linked in my argument that the firebombings in Germany qualified as terrorism is also part of a detailed article on justifying terrorism, Michael Walzer makes an excellent argument that the first of these bombings were justified. http://plato.stanford.edu... Pro: "Killing of volunteered combatants is not committing an immoral act" How about conscripted combatants? Armies aren't always made up exclusively of volunteers. ____________ I am out of characters once again. Terrorism can occasionally be justified. Thanks. Con.