Job Discussion Forums

[dmb]

There was a bomb in Galata bridge last night
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5162158,00.html

[molly farquharson]

thanks for this. my future son-in-law, who is working as a bodyguard in Bagdat, had heard this amd e-mailed me to ask if I was safe! He also mentioned that Bagdat was not as romantic as he had expected. Interesting on both counts.

I'd rather be in Istanbul than London these days...

[justme]

So it was actually a bomb? I kept missing the reports on the Turkish stations, and BBC and CNN have just been calling it an 'explosion', which could be a gas tank or whatever...

[dmb]

I think it was the same as the last london attack, where the detonator(remote control) went off but nothing else, so i was told today.

[scot47]

İ walked past that restraurant just a few hours before the bang. Scary ! BBC and CNN News did not give much gen about it - too busy reporting on the bombs at Sharm-El-Sheıkh.

Personally İ do not think it will get better.

Hery Ho ! Off to Bahrain tomorrow !

[justme]

I'm pretty sure I said it once before, but I'll say it again: I don't understand any of this.

Here's one thing I don't understand-- why do the media keep referring to these as suicide bombs? Especially I mean last week's attempted ones, where the guys left the bombs in backpacks, then ran away. How, exactly is that suicidal? Dangerous, yes, hauling around homemade explosives, but is this just becoming a buzzword?

And is it really possible the British police are becoming as stupid as the American ones? As in, if it has dark hair, skin, and eyes and it's looking shifty, kill it. Oh well. Sharing the shame a little, I suppose. Has anyone read anything about what lead the police to shoot that guy? What was he doing? Or is it like Diallo Amadu, reaching for his ID and getting shot 41 times because the police thought he was reaching for his gun and he happened to be the wrong race at the wrong time?

But here's the big thing I don't understand. What is it terrorists are trying to accomplish? Surely spreading terror and causing us infidels to hate and distrust Muslims is too vague a goal, especially considering the time, money, and organization that's going into this (I expect I'm not digging deeply enough in the news, but it seems like this is what CNN and BBC would have us believe). When these people claim responsibility or make threats, what's their goal? Like, we'll stop this when the US and Europe pull out of Israel? Or when the US releases the prisoners in Guantanamo? Or when the US pulls out of Iraq? If it's the last one, what did they want before the US went into Iraq? Maybe I'm being too logical and assuming they want something. Or maybe they're just like Dr. Evil and want a million dollars and world domination?

When the PKK bombs someone, we can assume they will continue doing this until they get a free and autonomous Kurdistan. But what about the ones who did London or the WTC?

I guess what I'm after is, if world leaders were to get together and do things to make terrorist groups happy enough to stop bombing everyone, what would they do to appease them? I keep wondering because I don't know how long it'll take them to figure out that whatever they're doing now isn't working. In fact, it seems to be making it worse.

It all makes me sick. And the fact that no one can do anything to stop it also makes me sick. So tired....

[Hector_Lector]

Go back to the 1970s and the Baader-Meinhof Gang. They said that the German government was latent-fascist and no-one knew it. Therefore, by committing various acts of terrorism, the government would be forced to take a heavy-handed approach and clamp down on civil liberties, therefore revealing their true fascist face. In the same way, Al Qaeda have �shown� the anti-Islamic face of the �West�. Twin Towers, knee-jerk reactions, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc etc. People who weren�t against Muslims in any way now regard the little old lady down the street as a terrorist and want her sent to Guantanamo. Little old lady�s son and his mates do something to protect their mum, get labelled as being �terrorists� and start growing their beards. More beardy men on the streets gets news, more �normal� people get nervous, more little old ladies get shouted at, and so on and so forth. Osama and his chums get taken more seriously and so it goes. Dubya speaks about �Crusades� and away we go. Suddenly, those virgins in Paradise seem much more realistic and tempting. Both sides get more extreme, even the liberals are saying, �If they come here, they should respect our rules�. Those who have come �here� say, �Why?�. The Spirit of the Blitz is invoked on one side, �Al Andaluz will be ours again!� on the other. Simple, innit?

Never mind, everyone will have calmed down in about a hundred years or so.

[dmb]

[Hector_Lector]

Better not to ask.

My mate **** was in the military for years, working undercover in Ulster, amongst other places, and he said that if we knew a fraction of what went on in the name of �law and justice�, we would s**t ourselves. He worked on a death squad for a while, �taking out� IRA suspects, doing high profile assassinations, ie blowing people�s heads off as they were sitting in their local, having a pint. The same tactics continue. So, next time you are in London, be careful of the quiet man in the corner.

[justme]

I like conspiracy theories too. There's part of me that's inclined to go along with some Turks in believing that the US bombed the WTC itself in order to have an excuse to raid Iraq and pass laws to spy on its own citizens in violation of our civil rights. Sometimes I also believe Bin Laden doesn't exist, though I guess if they were going to invent an enemy for us, they would have chosen someone more 'evil' looking-- Osama actually looks rather serene and beatific. But then, why would America do this? The oil supply in the ME is due to run out, at worst, in about 20 years, and 100 years at best. Perhaps just to pay back all that soft money and keep the war machine alive and thriving? The US certainly has a history of gallavanting off to war for little more than this reason...

In any case, I still don't get exactly why the terrorists are going to all this trouble...

[TeachEnglish]

I don't think any civilized person can understand why the terrorists go through all this trouble. These people are weak minded and therefore easy to brainwash. They are too stupid to understand this type of activity will never create peace. But they probably don't want peace. It is sad that one of their animals usually takes more than one of us with them when they carry out a bombing. These people are stupid brainwashed cowards and don't realize they are being used by people with evil minds. I've never wanted to see people killed or exterminated, but this trash needs to be taken out.

[justme]

Yes, that is probably true-- obviously these guys aren't the brightest bulbs in the box. But if the terrorists themselves are victims of brainwashing, then why are people brainwashing them? What is their goal? When they convince someone to blow himself up, and take out the infidels with him, what do they tell him he will ultimately accomplish? Of course, there's Paradise with the 40 virgins and everything, but I don't think sending guys to Paradise is what the leaders are after. What then? Is their goal to either kill all of us, or scare us into being just like them? Is it to punish us for something?

It just seems that for all the time and effort and money they're spending, they must be trying to acheive something. When Al Quaeda took credit for the WTC, did they explain why they did it? I mean, did they say 'We want such-and-such from you people or we'll do it again'? It just seems to me there must be a political or power-based motive behind this, but I can't for the life of me figure out what it is.

And thanks to the Patriot Act, I'm afraid to use the Internet to look up sites where Fundamentalists might explain these motives...

[saloma]

[saloma]

Woo Hoo! Yeah!

[dmb]

well done, send a pm to 31 and tell him how to do it