Terrorist Attack in London
March 23, 2017 5:06 AM   Subscribe

 
....

May the forces of peace and tolerance prevail against hatred and extremists of all stripes, both those who would claim responsibility and those who would seek to capitalize on this to infringe upon the principals of liberal democracy.
posted by leotrotsky at 5:12 AM on March 23, 2017 [14 favorites]


This is fake, but still wonderful.
posted by chavenet at 5:12 AM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


....

The Hot Fuzz guys cheered me up no end after a shit day, so very British.
posted by derbs at 5:24 AM on March 23, 2017 [18 favorites]


There are live updates here from the Guardian, hasn't been any of the fake news so a reliable source.
posted by ellieBOA at 5:26 AM on March 23, 2017


and ....

I spent yesterday evening checking in with all of the employees in the London office I manage, and feeling very far away. And a year ago yesterday I was doing the same with my employees in Brussels, and let's not talk about my home of Paris...
posted by ellieBOA at 5:30 AM on March 23, 2017 [5 favorites]


May the forces of peace and tolerance

History suggests not. Chavenets sign notwithstanding (or, arguably, given the We Won't Fight message it seems to give), the situation seems likely to get ever more polarized. I don't see how it can't. I tremble for our children.
posted by IndigoJones at 5:37 AM on March 23, 2017


Prediction: draconian new mass-surveillance laws will be rushed through. Theresa May will order ISPs to block encrypted messaging apps like Signal and WhatsApp, and call an emergency joint session of both houses of parliament to rush through a law creating a new crime of “surveillance evasion”, which covers the use of encrypted messaging, VPNs or similar countermeasures to avoid mass surveillance by the security services.
posted by acb at 5:43 AM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


hasn't been any of the fake news so a reliable source.

I got the impression news outlets were being more careful than in the past to not spread rumours and speculation about the attacker. The only place I heard speculation about background was from a foreign news outlet quoting another source that had since retracted the speculation.

From a mile away up the road from the scene, this felt in keeping with how things are done here.

....
posted by wingless_angel at 5:46 AM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


Oh, what a nuisance.

Terribly sad for the people injured, and for the bereaved.

We've already done pretty much all we can to stop this type of attack. Not much more we can do really. We'll hunt down the hive of inadequate little people who enabled this latest annoyance, obviously. It'll be more than harsh words this time, I'm afraid.

Jolly well done to the junior minister who tried to do his best for that poor, brave policeman. I'm always impressed, but never surprised, when people react like this. Sensible people run away. Good people take care of those in need. Excellent people run into the fray. We have many, many more excellent people than our enemies can imagine.

But we'll carry on carrying on, because that's what matters.

Down with this sort of thing, and we'll keep on taking care of each other. It's what we do.
posted by Combat Wombat at 6:00 AM on March 23, 2017 [27 favorites]


Sad event, glad that the fatalities were so low.

I'm not sure that this warrants an fpp however, much less the wall to wall coverage yesterday in the media of what was, at the end of the day, a disturbed individual causing four deaths and some injuries. The attention the media has given to this is exactly what the perpetrator wanted.

There are some interesting elements to the story news agencies retweeting violent images, and others complaining about this, and how these concerns differ depending upon which country an outrage took place in. The hyperbole of some commentators "We now live in a world where this can happen!!!" about a guy using a motor vehicle and a blade to cause violent harm as though this is some sort of breakthrough by the forces of darkness, again might be an interesting angle

I'm guessing this will sound heartless to many, but the whole "we will not be cowed or influenced by terrorists" line trotted out, jars with the (UK at least) wall to wall coverage of a saddo who was not very effective, and wanted that very exposure, seems counter-productive.

(By all means give the policeman a statue, mourn the dead, comfort the injured and bereaved. Curse the attacker if you must- just don't fetishise the inadequate fool.)
posted by Gratishades at 6:12 AM on March 23, 2017 [13 favorites]


One logical step would be to ban private vehicles from city centers or places where pedestrians congregate, and allow all other vehicles to be disabled easily from the exterior. This would be a great thing IMO.
posted by grubby at 6:19 AM on March 23, 2017 [7 favorites]


Gratishades: Apart from the terrible fatalities on the bridge, I think the part that makes this newsworthy, like the shooting at Canada's Parliament a couple of years ago, is the location.

Having been in Sydney during the 'siege', the US hearing about the underwear bombing both of which were covered in a completely hysterical, irresponsible way, in comparison I do think although the coverage has been very long here, it has been restrained, and elsewhere we've not seen the widespread repeat of (many) buildings lit up in the Union Jack nor people changing their Facebook profiles etc.
posted by wingless_angel at 6:31 AM on March 23, 2017 [6 favorites]


Gratishades: This is also something that we have been 'waiting for'/expecting in London, given the recent French, German, Belgian incidents, among others.
posted by ellieBOA at 7:14 AM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


A great success for the general British policy of restricting firearm availability. Probably a vindication of the deployment of armed policemen at high-profile sites, sadly.
posted by alasdair at 7:43 AM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


Same MO attempted in Antwerp today.
posted by Reggie Knoble at 7:48 AM on March 23, 2017


It's so lucky they intercepted him!
posted by ellieBOA at 7:51 AM on March 23, 2017


A great success for the general British policy of restricting firearm availability.

Actually, it is. Just imagine how many more people someone like this could have killed if he'd had a gun.
posted by Paul Slade at 8:03 AM on March 23, 2017 [23 favorites]


....

Here's to hoping that level-headedness and peace prevail. Individual experiences reflect our world – as ellieboa's illustrates. Nothing happens in a vacuum, and I for one appreciate compassion on MeFi. It helps to be reminded that not everyone tries to instrumentalize these things.
posted by fraula at 8:21 AM on March 23, 2017 [2 favorites]


Today, Farange and Katie Hopkins are furthering their careers stateside, courtesy of the American Fox Network (Graunaid Live updates)
posted by Mister Bijou at 9:08 AM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


...
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:44 AM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


History suggests not. Chavenets sign notwithstanding (or, arguably, given the We Won't Fight message it seems to give), the situation seems likely to get ever more polarized. I don't see how it can't. I tremble for our children.

I've got kids, and they're pretty nice. I work with a lot of nice people from all over the world, and they're pretty nice. I'm cautiously optimistic about the future. Having hope, after all, is the first step towards peace. It takes courage to have hope, and so we need to be brave. For our children.
posted by My Dad at 10:13 AM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


We've already done pretty much all we can to stop this type of attack. Not much more we can do really.

Fully protected bike lanes would have been enough to stop this pedestrian portion of the attack.
posted by srboisvert at 10:15 AM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


Disappointedly for Hopkins, Farage et al, turns out the attacker's a 52 year old from Kent.

Portion of my London friends reacted to the attack with "this is shit", and then moved onto discussing precisely how crap our terrorists are. "Going after tourists by Parliament in a Hyundai i40 on a Wednesday afternoon - could he not afford the Low Emissions Zone charge to use a lorry at the weekend?" Feel like this is a very British way to deal with things.
posted by MattWPBS at 10:22 AM on March 23, 2017 [11 favorites]




So, what's the difference between one disaffected middle-aged man driving a car into a crowd and other incidents of driving cars into crowds?

An awful lot of cars get driven into crowds by an awful lot of violent, homicidal losers.
posted by My Dad at 10:49 AM on March 23, 2017 [5 favorites]


One angry dude with a car and a knife can do disproportionate damage, but if he was unable to drag any more potential terrorists along with him it actually speaks to the fact that the "Islamic Community" is NO THREAT. If this is "Terrorism 2017", I feel totally UNterrorized and anybody who's scared because of this is a total wimp.
posted by oneswellfoop at 11:01 AM on March 23, 2017 [9 favorites]


An awful lot of cars get driven into crowds by an awful lot of violent, homicidal losers.

I couldn't find statistics on this. Does anyone have hard numbers?
posted by dragoon at 11:10 AM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


The "Islamic Community" *is* no threat.

However, extremism is a real thing. A number of ISIS plotters were arrested in my neighbourhood over the past several months. Plots are the kind of thing the UK security forces are good at uncovering. Solo artists, not so much.

None of which changes the fact that this guy seems to have been a bit of a crap terrorist. He did kill four people on his way out though, assuming no-one else dies.
posted by tel3path at 11:11 AM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


Yeah, not to downplay the fact that four people were killed, but as far as terrorist attacks go, that was a pretty pathetic attack by a pathetic loser. ISIS should be careful what they claim responsibility for. My guess is that not even pathetic losers will be impressed by it.

I think this message should be repeated loud and clear on all social media: If this is your holy war, then that's just pathetic. Go back to Soviet Raqqa!
posted by sour cream at 11:17 AM on March 23, 2017


to me, attacks like this underline how futile it is to try to stop terrorism with things like mass surveillance, and also how few people are really trying to commit acts of terror. i mean, if all you need is access to a car ????
posted by thedamnbees at 11:24 AM on March 23, 2017 [6 favorites]


tel3path, it's not so much that he's a crap terrorist, it's that he was almost certainly doing as much as he could get away with without MI5 stopping him. Rent or buy a big van? They'll know about it, and they'd certainly know about it once you got to central London (the post-Docklands bombing Ring of Steel). Anything bigger than a knife? Not going to happen.

I'm deeply saddened for the 3 victims murdered, and the loved ones of the 4 people killed, plus the people injured. But also, I have to admit this huge feeling of relief: I genuinely think this is something that Britain can harden itself against with a lower loss of civil liberties than any other country, and it seems that the powers that be are serious-minded enough on issue that they can respond proportionately. Very selfishly, I really needed any small reason to trust authority again, and this has helped.
posted by ambrosen at 11:25 AM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


So, what's the difference between one disaffected middle-aged man driving a car into a crowd and other incidents of driving cars into crowds?

Ideology? I hate to sound like some naif, but yes, violence driven by a political goal is pretty removed from the chaff you're throwing up here.
posted by Emma May Smith at 11:30 AM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


> the situation seems likely to get ever more polarized. I don't see how it can't. I tremble for our children.

It doesn't have to. The UK has been through much, much worse in the 70s and 80s. I grew up near Belfast during the Troubles, where you would routinely get searched and scanned and your bags X-rayed before being allowed to go into a shopping centre; when the terrorists were capable enough to bomb 10 Downing Street or take out a large chunk of the City of London without even having to resort to suicide attacks. This was pathetic in comparison; they didn't even keep Westminster tube closed for the evening (it was still open for interchange).

Anyway, not only did we survive the Troubles but we negotiated an effective peace, with former mortal enemies laughing together while getting down to the tedious but peaceful business of getting on with life.

The situation only gets worse by dint of people making it so.
posted by doop at 11:47 AM on March 23, 2017 [9 favorites]


I'm not scared, but I am not comfortable with trivializing this because the guy didn't kill all that many people or he used an uncool car to run over schoolkids.

I'm remembering the days when the Tube used to get evacuated several times a week and we thought nothing of it. I got curious and counted up the numbers of deaths in terrorist incidents in London in the 20th and 21st centuries (Wikipedia):

1939: 1
1972: 1
1974: 2
1975: 2 + 1 (separate incidents)
1976: 1
1977: 3
1979: 1
1980: 1
1981: 2 + 1
1982: 11 plus 7 horses
1983: 6
1984: 1
1986: 1
1988: 1
1989: 1 (the bomber)
1990: 1
1991: 1
1992: 3 + 1
1993: 1
1996: 2 + 1
1999: 3
2005: 52
2013: 1
2017: 4 (so far, and including the attacker)

I'm not trying to urge people to be afraid, or argue that this guy was actually somehow impressive or deserves respect, or anything like that. I'm also aware that it may seem like very little from a US perspective where mass shootings are de rigueur.

I just... jeering at him doesn't strike the sarcastic tone with me that was probably intended. Would it be more effective if the next guy drove a Jaguar and managed to kill 5 people? I appreciate the efforts to trivialize him, but as a Londoner of long standing it feels... beside the point? not even wrong? to put it this way.
posted by tel3path at 11:47 AM on March 23, 2017 [8 favorites]


Ideology? I hate to sound like some naif, but yes, violence driven by a political goal is pretty removed from the chaff you're throwing up here.

But is the ideology the motivation or the rationalisation for a more intrinsic motivation (i.e., dissatisfaction with one's life/regarding oneself to be of negative social value/resentment against others)?

I suspect that it's rationalisation; case in point: the Orlando, Florida shooter, who was motivated by inability to come to terms with his sexuality, and picked up Islamism as a rationalisation for running amok*. (If your life is so irredeemably turned to shit that you must annihilate yourself and preferably take some of those smug, satisfied others with you, it helps to have a transcendent ideal to cloak your final act in.

* A Malay word for this phenomenon, when those with no way out go on a murder/suicide spree.
posted by acb at 11:50 AM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


Tel3path: yeah it feels a bit flip to me too. My favourite put down if we need to use one that could be appropriate here too was aimed at that crazy guy who stabbed someone on the tube in Leytonstone: #youaintnomuslimbruv
posted by wingless_angel at 11:51 AM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


I don't mean to trivialize this; I don't think anyone does. I do think that we've been through much worse, and that panicking or trembling for the children or #prayforlondoning are counterproductive responses - terrorism doesn't work if there's no terror. There's a good reason that Ken Livingstone's response to the 7/7 bombings was "you will fail"; for the same reason, Sadiq Khan kept banging on last night about how London is still open, Parliament is sitting the next day as usual, we're a big mixed city of all kinds of people living together and largely getting on, etc - it's the opposite of what the killing is intended to achieve.
posted by doop at 12:07 PM on March 23, 2017 [4 favorites]


1982: 11 plus 7 horses

I thought this list was just deaths by terrorism on the Underground, and it was simultaneously charming and horrifying that there were seven horses down there that got killed.
posted by Etrigan at 12:11 PM on March 23, 2017


I thought this list was just deaths by terrorism on the Underground, and it was simultaneously charming and horrifying that there were seven horses down there that got killed.

What did you think pulled the trains?
posted by acb at 12:19 PM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


But is the ideology the motivation or the rationalisation for a more intrinsic motivation (i.e., dissatisfaction with one's life/regarding oneself to be of negative social value/resentment against others)?

Does it matter? There is not much difference between an ideology which motivates violence and one which rationalizes it. Indeed, "do X," and, "it's okay to do X," seem infinitesimally close to me. If the Orlando murderer took up a belief because it devalued the lives of LGBT people and made it okay to kill them, then how does the same belief affect the views on LGBT people for those who already hold it?
posted by Emma May Smith at 12:21 PM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


Rewind... Ken Liviingstone's "you will fail" speech after the London 7/7 2005 attack (52 dead, 700+ non-fatal injuries) YT
posted by Mister Bijou at 12:23 PM on March 23, 2017 [5 favorites]


What did you think pulled the trains?

It was 1982. I figured Thatcher had replaced the horses with orphans by then.
posted by Etrigan at 12:24 PM on March 23, 2017 [23 favorites]


it's not so much that he's a crap terrorist, it's that he was almost certainly doing as much as he could get away with without MI5 stopping him. Rent or buy a big van? They'll know about it, and they'd certainly know about it once you got to central London (the post-Docklands bombing Ring of Steel). Anything bigger than a knife? Not going to happen.

I think you're crediting the security services with a bit more than they're due here. Severely doubt there's a central list of "people who have rented a removal van" anywhere. You can buy an axe at any hardware store without giving info, or a sword online if you want. He could have stolen or rented a lorry, or simply waited until the weekend when the bridge would have been packed. He's intentionally trying to kill people, and managing a lower death toll than a bin lorry driver falling asleep at the wheel is just objectively crap. I'm bloody glad he was incompetent, because I don't think there's really any argument to make that he couldn't have done a lot worse with blindingly obvious changes.
posted by MattWPBS at 1:17 PM on March 23, 2017 [2 favorites]


That 'You will fail' speech always makes me tear up. It's a perfect expression of solidarity and defiance.
posted by prune at 1:24 PM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


There isn't a central list of vehicle-buyers other than... the vehicle registry..., but once you're known to the intelligence services I'm not sure what would raise a flag with them (one isn't supposed to know, of course).
posted by tel3path at 1:37 PM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


Does it matter? There is not much difference between an ideology which motivates violence and one which rationalizes it.

I think it matters, in that it helps us classify such attacks, not alongside Pearl Harbour and the Nazi invasion of Poland, but rather alongside high-school shootings and “going postal”. They're not soldiers of an implacable enemy force, or the vanguard of an invading horde, but a more mundane tragedy. And making such a classification matters because the whole aim of terrorism is to magnify its psychological impact.
posted by acb at 1:38 PM on March 23, 2017 [3 favorites]


There isn't a central list of vehicle-buyers other than... the vehicle registry...

Which has Sweet Fanny Adams to do with a list of people renting a van.
posted by MattWPBS at 1:41 PM on March 23, 2017


Which has Sweet Fanny Adams to do with a list of people renting a van.

I'd be surprised if the security services didn't have a firehose of all credit card transactions in real time, and some proprietary Fort Meade version of IFTTT configured to flag transactions based on various rules (“a card previously used to top up a phone geolocated at a known radical mosque/anarchist bookshop/&c. has been used to buy ammunition/hire a van” and such). Not sure whether hiring a van with cash would get around that or raise other flags.
posted by acb at 1:45 PM on March 23, 2017


Right, sorry, I'm on mobie and afterwards realized the difference abput renting not buying a van. However my main point still stands that once you're known to MI5 like he was, that's when they watch you for suspicious activity so, given the trend of mowing diwn people with cars, if he tried to get a bigger car through legit channels it might have been noticed.

And the fact that he was known to MI5 suggests that political motives were at least a peg on which to hang his suicidality. How much of each ingredient who can say but the Grauniad had a decent article on this, will link shortly.
posted by tel3path at 1:46 PM on March 23, 2017


And if they do have a firehose they probably don't want it, because a firehose has no precision.
posted by tel3path at 1:49 PM on March 23, 2017


there you go
posted by tel3path at 1:51 PM on March 23, 2017


So I work in a central government department in Westminster, a 2 min walk from Parliament, at the top of a tower looking out at Big Ben, Parliament etc. I was at work on Wednesday, and like others in my office first got the hint that something was happening when we noticed the air ambulance landing.

From our point of view, the immediate effect was that there was an announcement on the PA system asking us to check on people who were out of the office, some roads were closed and getting south of the river was a bit more difficult than usual, so a few of us went to the pub, which was hardly out of the ordinary. Today there were still a few closed roads, and police helicopters were slightly more noticeable than usual, but probably only because we aware of it - there are helicopters in the air in Westminster every day of the week.

While I absolutely do not want to diminish the loss and suffering of those who were killed or injured, this was very much a local event, and felt like something on the order of a bad road traffic accident or similar - a tragedy for those involved to be sure, but sort of just one of those things that happens.

So the 24hr news coverage feels somewhat overwrought, given that life in Westminster got back to normal almost immediately, if it had even changed at all. We don't really need that endless inspirational tube posters and #londonstandstogether stuff in my opinion, and we most fucking definitely don't need Katie Hopkins or Fox News and co banging on about London or Londoners on any level whatsoever. This doesn't say anything significant about multiculturalism, integration, social cohesion, or really anything at all. Ultimately some twat drove his knife to a gunfight, sadly some people were killed or injured, and the city collectively shook its head, gave an imperceptible shrug, then went to the pub.
posted by influx at 3:03 PM on March 23, 2017 [21 favorites]


My sister works for the SNP in Westminster and was safely inside yesterday, though she saw quite a lot of the aftermath. We briefly skyped today and most of the time was spent playing with my 21-month-old son. But we talked a bit about the after effects of something like this. Things are slowly sinking in for her and she felt like it would take a while for the event to shake out in her.

Some time ago my apartment in Providence was the target of an attempted terrorist attack (or rather my Israeli roommate). I was safely on the other side of the world (randomly enough at a MeFite meetup in Sydney which I realized in the middle of an FBI interview was a suspiciously ironclad alibi). I was never in any danger but it still played havoc with my psyche, leading to recurring nightmares and some irrational behavior that wound up hurting me and others.

I'm not worried about London, but it worries me to see a group of people with as much power as the British parliament deciding to plow on without giving themselves time to reflect and process what happened. Hopefully there will be some time taken out for that because in my experience that will be needed.
posted by Kattullus at 3:22 PM on March 23, 2017 [2 favorites]


So I work in a central government department in Westminster...

Likewise, although I'm out of the country at the minute. Your comment pretty much sums up the responses I got back from colleagues when I messaged to check in. After confirming they were safe and expressing sadness, most messages were about their plans to find a pub or work annoyances.

Things would have been different if it had been a bomb or gun attack though I suspect.
posted by knapah at 3:36 PM on March 23, 2017


>So, what's the difference between one disaffected middle-aged man driving a car into a crowd and other incidents of driving cars into crowds?

Ideology? I hate to sound like some naif, but yes, violence driven by a political goal is pretty removed from the chaff you're throwing up here.


I don't know what you mean by "chaff", but I was being serious, and I was discussing this issue in good faith (i.e., I wasn't "throwing up" / regurgitating anything).

Anyway, I would suggest that what happened in London may have been driven by ideology, but even so it was an incoherent ideology. It's not like the 1991 attack on Downing Street, for example.

It was just a crime, and these terrorist attacks should be treated as such. It's just somewhere on the spectrum of similar acts of violence carried out every single day by other men around the world (I encourage you to check out my link to see what I mean).
posted by My Dad at 3:38 PM on March 23, 2017


Yesterday my very huge, distributed organization's central office left me a voicemail saying we notice you're working in London today, can you call back and confirm you're OK? I thought that was really sweet.

Then I messaged my colleague, also working in London yesterday. He's Greek, new to the city, and not used to this. He said he was fine and this is just the way things are nowadays, so was just going to stay indoors for the next two days and not leave the house.

I thought about assuring him it's fine and he could go outside that very minute and be fine. But then I realized that according to Lifetime he would automatically get blown up in a freak incident, and I would have to spiral into a vortex of self-recrimination because it would be MY FAULT.

Of course the flip side of that is he's probably still stuck at home peering out through the letter box and I have to blame myself for that too.
posted by tel3path at 4:22 PM on March 23, 2017


autos contain a structurally murderous ideology. for people who walk places.
posted by eustatic at 5:01 PM on March 23, 2017 [6 favorites]


One logical step would be to ban private vehicles from city centers or places where pedestrians congregate, and allow all other vehicles to be disabled easily from the exterior. This would be a great thing IMO.

Really? Have you really thought this through? I doubt it is possible to preempt this sort of attack in a FREE and OPEN society. Personally I am not willing to give up my freedom for the illusion of safety.
posted by notreally at 5:27 PM on March 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


From the current article:

The third person killed by the attacker was named as Kurt Cochran, a tourist from Utah in the US. He and his wife, Melissa, were on the last day of a trip to Europe to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary. Melissa remains in hospital with serious injuries.

It's all terrible, but this in particular breaks my heart, because Dr. Tully Monster and I celebrated our 25th anniversary just a couple months ago with a week-long trip to Tokyo. *crosses self* God grant Melissa Cochran peace, healing, and strength. God grant these things to all the injured and survivors of the dead. (I can't quite bring myself to pray for mercy for the soul of the attacker, at this point, and I don't think it's my place to do so.)
posted by tully_monster at 10:30 PM on March 23, 2017


An awful lot of cars get driven into crowds by an awful lot of violent, homicidal losers.

I couldn't find statistics on this. Does anyone have hard numbers?


There was one in Melbourne earlier this year with (IIRC) the same number of casualties. It reportedly wasn't terror related, just a mad sad crazy guy. One of the people killed was my young daughter's friend. It's a very hard thing to explain.

I don't know if anyone is keeping statistics worldwide, but according to this page there have been 55 vehicular ramming attacks in Israel alone since September 2015. So I guess it has become a popular tactic or is about to become so.
posted by Joe in Australia at 12:28 AM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


> One logical step would be to ban private vehicles from city centers or places where pedestrians congregate

In London we call this "the congestion charge".
posted by doop at 12:41 AM on March 24, 2017 [7 favorites]


to me, attacks like this underline how futile it is to try to stop terrorism with things like mass surveillance, and also how few people are really trying to commit acts of terror. i mean, if all you need is access to a car ????

That's one argument. There's also one that says mass surveillance and other security accoutrements have reduced terrorism to desperate acts by one-off lunatics.

So far.
posted by Chitownfats at 3:51 AM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


That's one argument. There's also one that says mass surveillance and other security accoutrements have reduced terrorism to desperate acts by one-off lunatics.

Well, the Brits did manage to seriously curtail the IRA partly by having so many spies in the IRA there was little organizational room left for real terrorists.
posted by srboisvert at 8:25 AM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


Well, the Brits did manage to seriously curtail the IRA partly by having so many spies in the IRA there was little organizational room left for real terrorists.

And yet, they got what they wanted. Worth noting is the fact that the IRA tended to target politicians and RUC. They would not have had the kind of support they got (largely American, alas) if they had targeted airplanes and London tourists.

Anyway, I would suggest that what happened in London may have been driven by ideology, but even so it was an incoherent ideology.... It was just a crime, and these terrorist attacks should be treated as such.

Hate crime, surely? And as an ideology, it is surely quite coherent to those who sign up. Evil, yes. But not incoherent. (Anyway, what matter if it's coherent or not? The victims are just as dead.)
posted by IndigoJones at 1:19 PM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


So apparently he rented a 4x4 for the occasion.
posted by tel3path at 2:15 PM on March 24, 2017


....
Not again.
posted by daybeforetheday at 3:25 PM on March 24, 2017


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