Islamic Terrorism is Overrated

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Islamic terrorism, you've certainly heard of it. However this article really renewed my interest in the matter. After all, if terrorism is seen as such a massive overwhelming threat in the U.S., then why didn't the numbers add up to that conclusion? Just to give you some examples, it would be 10 times more likely to die from a bicycling accident then from any form of terrorism in the U.S.. Even better yet, the chances of being killed by an actual illegal immigrant or refuge terrorist (the types that people are actually worried about) are so astronomically low that dying from an asteroid impact would be more plausible.

And yet, the general American populace is so terrified of this threat from the middle east that many are practically preparing for an Islamic invasion, even though I would dare say that we pose a far more serious threat to them than they ever could to us. So, why is there this huge discrepancy? Well, the answers I'd imagine are many. One, of course, would be the over-representation of terrorism in the media. This, in turn, is mostly caused by the profit incentive. After all, if the population is in a state of furor about something, then why not report even the slightest instance of that something to a receptive audience in order to gain even more profit? This seems like a severe problem with the mainstream media that results from an irrational populous and doesn't just apply to Islamic terrorism as well.

Anyways, is there anything someone would like to add to my drawn out and hard-to-understand thesis

P.S.: I realize that since terrorism is a hot button topic this thread is gonna be quite controversial. I simply ask that you remain civil and provide some evidence if you have a counter argument. Any debate should place reason above all else, and if you think I am being unreasonable, then please tell me.

I do agree with you that terrorism=money to the media outlets. The thing is, an accident is an accident, whether it's dying in a meteor shower or bicycling accident. One does not go out looking for an accident, and they are tragic when it happens.

It's a totally different matter, though, when you're in the mall looking for a new pair of shoes and some nitwit decides to blow the complex sky high. It's man made and it's ridiculous. That's the difference over terrorism.

As a threat to the west probably overated. In the middle and near east not overated.

Arguably it was not overrated 15 years ago when Bin Ladin had the resouces to launch simultaneous mega attacks and maybe was on his way to getting a nuke. ISIS can kill dozens or hundreds but does not seem have the ability to take down the economy.

The problem in America is overreaction. There were thousands of attacks by the fringes of the new left, attacks by Puerto Rican nationlists, black militants, anti abortionists, and hijackings of airlines were common during the late 1960's and 1970's. The Senate and Pentagon were bombed. The difference is there were no massive lockdowns and shelter in place orders. There is a movie out now "Patriots Day" about the Boston Marathon Bombing. The shutdown and paralysis of a major metropolitan area for several days by two relative amateurs is something we should be embarrassed about nevermind glorifying.

I think it's because they feel that there's actually a chance of ending or at least impeding a terrorist organization. We feel that using military or diplomatic means we can stop the threat of an attack. You can't really talk your bike into being more careful or a plane from crashing, you can only modify them to help lower the chances of an error, which we already do. Also, since you're exposed to it every day, AND it is made by a manufacturer which doesn't threaten your existence, you're more likely to feel more comfortable.

I think you've made a similar mistake to what I do A LOT. Grouping together two ideas based on characteristics but not on societally mandated values. Essentially, it's like seeing an elderly woman and a young child, and questioning why the child is not treated with the same respect as the elderly woman, and why they're treated any differently, because we can recognize that they are both humans with many similarities, but we may miss the more complex factors that are covertly hidden in the abstractions of these two age states, such as experience or a long tradition of respecting our elders. Sorry if this makes no sense, I'm just taking a stab at something I have done little thinking about.

Absolutely.

All of the mass shootings (Islamic inspired or otherwise)in given year in the US combined take probably fewer 200 lives a year.

In a fraction of the mass killings the shooter latched onto ISIS/Islam to justify the mass killing. So maybe fifty to a 100 Americans die a year of "Islamic terrorism".

In the same given year 30 thousand Americans die on the highway of traffic accidents (half of those by drunk drivers).

The number of Americans killed by Islamic terrorism in typical year is about the same as those killed by bee stings.

So yes- statistically speaking Islamic terrorism is a trivial factor as a cause of death in the USA.


But terrorist acts are more demoralizing. We adapt to the constant mundane dangers of life like highway deaths. In contrast someone suddenly spraying bullets at a rock concert in Paris is something that you cant deal with (neither practically nor emotionally).

Not sure what the lesson is though.

ISIS does heinous things like sexually enslave people, and burn people alive in front of internet TV cameras. But even in the middle east itself ISIS has only murdered less than five thousand people. More civilians have been murdered by Assad than by ISIS.

Obviously terrorism is a problem. But the hysteria that terrorism generates can be exploited by politicians to get elected, and enact inane policies.

It is not just the killing; it's also the loss in freedoms.

TSA is the most obvious ....

I generally agree with the whole argument of terrorism comes very low on the list of things likely to kill you.

However, there are some details here which need to be pointed out. I give them credit for including the 9/11 deaths in the equation, but there are two things wrong with it. The start date. That should be placed where Islamic terorism began targetting the US. The second problem is not including American born terrorists. Islamic terrorism is the issue not foreign born terrorism, an Islamic terrorist is an Islamic terrorist no matter where they come from. Islam transcends nations. No nation is at war with the US. (I know they're not included because it's about Trump's ban)

Of lesser importance since you can't really measure it in numbers is the fact terrorism is not something that happens at the same rate. There could be another 9/11 scale atrocity or worse tomorrow. It's also something that evolves, as we see with these new (for the West anyway, as Israelis will point out) vehicle attacks.

The thing about spending money on a disease that kills 6 people a year is also a bad argument. For every successful terrorist attack, many others are stopped. Cut back on terrorism spending and less of these will be stopped, and cut back enough and types that were previously impossible or very difficult no longer are.

I think what does deeply trouble me is the mass chilling effect on speech and open criticism, self-monitoring, and cowardice it inflicts. Worse still many politicians play some really dark games with it - particularly with notions like making blasphemy against Islam illegal, we see such a motion going on in Canada to the north of us right now.

I'll give a few examples of how terrorism, while it kills very few people, gets work very pernicious to our liberties accomplished. I don't think we need to talk too much about 9/11 and what that did to how the US does things or how we board planes. In 2004 Theo Van Gogh makes a film about Islam and its mistreatment of women in Denmark and is assassinated with a note attached to his chest with a knife. The staff at Charlie Hebdo, feeling the need to be make fun of everything if they're to be properly courageous, makes fun of Islam and includes Mohammad in their comics. In 2015 two men storm the office with assault rifles killing 12 and injuring 11. It seems like hardly anyone has had the courage to do what they've done largely because they've seen the consequences, and I think only recently have enough people decided to partake in contests like Draw Mohammad Day and the like (buffered by the anonymity of the internet), which if we tried to think of that in terms of a 'Draw Jesus Day' which gave good odds of being a free speech martyr it gets absurd to imagine just how few parallels there are or how few religions in the world are quite like it.

We also have similar problems in the west happening from a different ideological sickness where instead of people being afraid of getting blown up or machine-gunned down to aloha akbar they're afraid of losing jobs, being black-balled out of any ability to find further work, and on a much more broad base witch-hunted at the slightest drive-by snippet allegation (amplified to absurdity) that they're racist, sexist, etc.. People see the McCarthy hearings of the 1950's as a sickness, it might be true that it was a top-down board, and yet we've got similarly absurd things in this sector going on today (the Christakis's at Yale are a great example of this).


The same philosophy works with the mafia for example. They don't need to put that many people in cement overshoes and displays of wanton violence before nearly everyone starts doing whatever they're saying and even bending over backwards to make a clean and opened path for them to do things however they want to do them. With protection rackets they can cowe whole communities into paying heavy bribes with the understanding that violence will be visited on them if they don't pay (which it will - otherwise everyone stops paying). It creates a culture where no one sees anything, no one remembers what happened if a crime occurred, etc. etc..


Intimidation culture is just not what we want. If we get used to it it pretty much means that whatever group is holding the stick can get away with increasing amounts of dominance and brutality based on our acceptance. If a whole country falls under that spell they're ripe for authoritarian dictatorship.

Yes, that and the immense amount of money that could be better spent is taking a heavy toll. And look at all the Muslim crime issues in Europe.

Terrorism did not curtail our liberties. Fear of terrorism and the belief that curtailing of liberties is something only people with something to hide need worry it about did.

We may not know the details but when Dick Cheney said right after 9/11 we are going to go into dark places and Patriot Act was passed we had a general idea. And when details have been released the people we elected kept on renewing it and other similar laws.

The "new normal" is something we choose and should be blamed for as a nation.

let's not forget that the terrorists allow for a simple narrative and a simple course of action (turned out not so simple, but hey, it got into it's 16th season, prequels not counted) , while there's looming environmental catastrophe and a failing economic system, which both seem to need supernational regulating bodies to fix. Since organizing THAT is really quite a hassle, let's better prepare and have walls and checks in place for when the system fails or the oceans rise. The Afghan people are drone targetting-practice for what's to come. But that's allright. if we can't be bothered to fix it, let's at least prepare.

(I'm one of those snowflake-millenials, as you might have guessed, who's upset that the world he'll inherit is about to self destruct. silly me, - it shows that I haven't ever worked a proper job!)

And also to several other posters, I can agree with you that the relentless safety measures imposed on the American populace (this includes the CIA and NSA spying on us) are more detrimental to the U.S. than anything, and as far as I know, have stopped little to no actual terrorist attacks from taking place. So yes, the War on Terror can be somewhat ridiculous at times, and that's not even mentioning the hypocrisy of it (For example the countless drone strikes, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the many government overthrows in the Middle East supported by the U.S., have caused far more death and terror to the native Muslims then the 911 attacks or other instances of terrorism ever had on us).