thing i wish this website would remember after mass shootings:
there is a difference between international terrorism and domestic acts of terror; there is also a difference between an organized terrorist plot and a lone person committing an attack which causes terror
“lone wolf” terrorists have been a thing for ages – they are people committing terrorist attacks with no link to specified terrorist organisations (think the Oklahoma bomber)
if the Vegas shooter had an ideological agenda he is a terrorist (think Dylann Roof, whose ideological agenda was to start a race war)
if the Vegas shooter had no ideological agenda he is a person who committed an act which causes terror, but in strict definitions is not a terrorist (think Adam Lanza, the Columbine shooters, etc, who had no ideological agenda and were instead motivated by various personal reasons)
someone being mentally ill is not an excuse, and calling them mentally ill is not excusing them
sane people do not shoot places up
sane people do not kill themselves
what Stephen Paddock did was terrible, however this does mean we can all ignore the fact he was probably mentally ill
no, not all mentally ill people want to murder people, but some do
there are lots of problems in how these things are reported, but not all of it is malicious racism or whatever. it’s just there are specifics as to what makes someone a terrorist, and a mentally ill man with a gun shooting innocent people because his life sucks isn’t a terrorist agenda
it’s a symptom of something, undeniably, but yelling at one another over racism and ableism won’t get us anywhere
yall have this debate every time like?? like for example the reason the pulse nightclub shooter was called a terrorist wasn’t because he was brown, it was because he killed people for an political ideology and literally swore allegiance to ISIS
tl;dr when you’re in law enforcement or the media you can’t call everyone a terrorist just because they did something that caused terror; terrorism has an actual definition and usually requires an ideology; some mass shootings are terrorist attacks but most aren’t; the shooter, regardless of motivation, was mentally ill because sane people don’t do this shit; it’s possible to accept he was mentally ill and still not feel sympathy or condone what he did; stop thinking all mentally ill people are kind and innocent, it’s not ableist to acknowledge that sometimes people’s symptoms make them do terrible shit, so long as you don’t think all mentally ill people are ticking timebombs
tl;dr of the tl;dr: read it and please learn something
blakekathryn
kaledo-art
origamiaround
germansingergirl
