Terror

 How worried should we be of terrorism? And what is the definition of terror?

When we hear the word terrorism in the news, we often associate the term with suicide bombings, and often with Islamic extremists. It is partially because of this reason that some people are Islamophobic, albeit it goes too far to the point of being racist that it is not any more clear on the surface if the resulting behavior is a result of phobia or merely racism.

The word terrorism has become so broadly used that any violence related to a certain ideology or any bombings made in the name of religion has been tagged as terroristic activity. Harming innocent people to have them fear for their lives and disrupt their everyday life is clearly the benchmark of classifying and applying the term, seems to be a perfect fit.

Harming civilians to gain attention to their causes, and especially targeting ordinary people with a bomb detonated in crowded places, can be within the realms of terror without a need of any good reasoning. These acts are vicious and evil to the point of common sense, so that terror as an act aims to elicit alarm and irrational fear from the population that it has become self-evident and self-explanatory.

Anything that intimidates us to face the consequences of a certain ideology because of our defiance, or even just by following our own set of beliefs contrary to theirs, has become a controversial groundwork for what terrorism entails. People debate the scope of the term, and while nobody would know for certain, extremists have been often tagged as terrorists because of the way they use violence to pursue their political aims.

What is clear is that extremism has something to do with a political agenda, and the means to achieve this goal is to destroy the status quo and wage violence against innocent people. Sometimes, they operate in stealth, only to strike when the timing is perfect. It seems that the mechanism in pursuing their political goals includes harming the population and children, as well.

Terror may be a relative term to some, but a firm subservient matter of defense to governments. It is often misunderstood, and inappropriately justified. This is the root of the problem of terrorism. It is unclear, mostly rooted in poverty, and no definite lines were drawn to delineate its boundaries. The lost of many lives while it happens is simply untenable. Nobody, especially children, deserves to live in an environment of hate and violence. And no person deserves to be harmed for no apparent reason.

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The Editorial is sponsored by Audi.