Homicide bombing

Homicide bombing is a Newspeak term used by Fox News for what is referred to by everyone else, including the US military, as a suicide bombing — a type of terrorist attack in which the attacker detonates explosives attached to their body or vehicle in an attempt to kill others and themselves at the same time, thereby ensuring the success of the detonation and that they escape (mortal) judgement for their crime. It has been used by only a very few terrorist organizations or movements, most notably the Tamil Tigers, PKK, and various factions of Islamist fundamentalist terrorists.
As a perfect example of conservative deceit, Fox News is the only news organisation that took up the Bush White House's request to change the language and use the term "Homicide Bombing". Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer introduced the term, because as Dr. Andrew Cline wrote, "suicide bomber" validated the crime and the bomber's cause.http://www.diplomacy.edu/language/rhetoric/power.htm The fact is that the term "homicide bomber" is at best completely redundant. The term "bombing" generally refers to attempts to take human life, and almost every bombing ends up taking human life, so all of them, regardless of intent — suicide bombing, car bombing, or even bombing runs by airplanes on the Good Guys' side — are "homicide bombings". While there have been cases where the bombings are directed against structures rather than people, those bombings are an exception in terrorist attacks. If a terrorist bombing fails to kill anyone, it is almost invariably due to the incompetence of the terrorist rather than any lack of murderous intent. Since the term fails to include any reference to the self-inflicted death of the assailant, which is the defining nature of the act and what sets it apart from other terrorist acts, it is a weak term. It actually manages to describe the crime less accurately than the commonly used term, "suicide bombing". Usage of the term in journalism therefore actually hides the full horror of the crime: that someone is prepared to sacrifice their life for their cause, which is pretty harrowing when you think about it.
Psychiatrist and suicide prevention expert Professor Robert Goldney called for the phrase "homicide bomber" to be used because the phrase "suicide bomber" risks "normalising" suicide and could even lead to increased suicide. Goldney also notes that suicide bombers are quite different in their mental state from most people who attempt or commit suicide.Why it's "homicide bomber" not "suicide bomber". University of Adelaide. Published 2 Sept 2013.
==Timeline of usage (and non-usage)==
===11 Apr 2002===
===12 Apr 2002===
===21 May 2002===
During a speech to the National Association of District Attorneys, FBI Director Robert Mueller warns that suicide-homicide bombers in the United States itself was "inevitable". On the same day, the New York Times reported that Osama bin Laden was planning an attack as big as 9/11, though the "warnings are said to be vague but disturbing".http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/5/20/162651.shtml
===25 June 2002===
===17 Jul 2002===
===18 Sep 2002===
===22 Nov 2002===
===30 Apr 2003===
===6 Oct 2003===
===7 Oct 2003===
===6 Feb 2004===
===9 Jul 2004===
===23 May 2006===
(George Bush) In a joint address with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel: "(Reporter) The U.S. has the most powerful military in the world, and they have been unable to bring down the violence in any substantial way in several of the provinces. So how can you expect the Iraqis to do that? (George Bush) If one were to measure progress on the number of suiciders, if that's your definition of success, I think it gives -- I think it will -- I think it obscures the steady, incremental march toward democracy we're seeing. In other words, it's very difficult -- you can have the most powerful army of the world -- ask the Israelis what it's like to try to stop suiciders -- it is a difficult task to stop suicide bombers. That's the -- but that's one of the main -- that's the main weapon of the enemy, the capacity to destroy innocent life with a suicider." http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2006/05/20060523-9.html
===28 Feb 2007===
===20 Nov 2009===
(Fox News) Proving that they are not ones to let a bad idea go, Fox News is still using the term:
* 
* Pamela Geller was still using the phrase in 2016.BBC, Reuters Paint Muslim Homicide Bomber as 'Syrian Migrant Killed in German Blast', Pamela Geller.com, 28 July 2016
==See also==
*Suicide bombing, a similar but actually helpful term
==Notes==
==References==
Category:Conservative deceit
Category:Media
Category:Neologisms
Category:Political terms
Category:Propaganda