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[Maledict]

Tereasa May has a hard on for a police state. This is just phase 1. In fact no, the snoopers charter was phase 1, fuck lot of good that did clearly. I would rather live under the threat of terrorism than sit back and watch civil liberties be eroded by a right wing totalitarian government for my "safety".

Theresa May has *nothing*& to do with this decision on the threat level. Nothing at all. It's done by an independent committee that she cannot influence, by design. Even a few hours ago she was talking about the level remaining at severe. It has been changed due to intelligence officials having solid intel on further attacks or an active cel.

That does not mean there will be an attack, for a variety of reasons - but this isn't political, it's purely about the risk of a threat. Critical has historically only ever been used for a few days at a time, because it is a threat and intel specific rating. You can't just push it to critical and leave it there.

 

[Acorn]

The mother of the 8 year old is critically injured in hospital and doesn't know the news yet.

Jeez

That's heartbreaking.

 

[ferrasvansen]

The mother of the 8 year old is critically injured in hospital and doesn't know the news yet.

Yeah I saw that, dreadful situation. Really struggling with all this spent all day with my young ten year old nephew who lives with us, I'm lucky to have that chance.

 

[Ravensmash]

What? I don't want the army on our streets. You see it France and it does not make you feel safer. The police is stretched to thin? Well her government dropped police numbers due to cuts so its her fucking fault!

Yeah, but we're in the aftermath of a significant terrorist attack - and all measures should be available to the government to ensure that a visible security presence is felt.

I don't know about France but for a lot of people here, seeing armed officers/the Army would make them feel safe in the wake of this.

 

[azyless]

Your link only claims that 2% are "Religiously Motivated." It doesn't give a figure for how many are committed by muslims, nor does it give a definition for what counts as a terrorist attack or what the numerator and denominator are for the calculated percentage, and the whole article seems generally agenda-driven and nebulous in its claims.

That article and the Europol document don't even give the definition of what they call "terrorist attacks" (at least I didn't see one when skimming the beginning of the doc) but my guess is they're considering pretty tame stuff.
Since they like stats so much here's one :

 

[Wrestlemania]

That article and the Europol document don't even give the definition of what they call "terrorist attacks" (at least I didn't see one when skimming the beginning of the doc) but my guess is they're considering pretty tame stuff.
Since they like stats so much here's one :

While any death from terrorism is tragic, that really does put into perspective how insignificant the number of deaths has been.
The idea that people talk about halting refugee programmes, immigration and even deporting citizens to stop the deaths of fewer than 200 people each year across a continent is laughable.

 

[cyberheater]

The idea that people talk about halting refugee programmes, immigration and even deporting citizens to stop the deaths of fewer than 200 people each year across a continent is laughable.

How is any of this laughable?

 

[Wrestlemania]

How is any of this laughable?

Those are laughable "solutions" proposed by people whose motives clearly are not just in halting terrorist attacks. Feel free to explain to me how any of them or realistic propositions for stopping last nights or most other recent attacks though.

 

[Nevasleep]

You know what saddened me when I realized, some of those "missing reports" by friends & family are fatalities where the police are attempting to contact next of kin or perhaps even trying to identify the bodies.

 

[pswii60]

The mother of the 8 year old is critically injured in hospital and doesn't know the news yet.

Oh my word

 

[ClosingADoor]

While any death from terrorism is tragic, that really does put into perspective how insignificant the number of deaths has been.
The idea that people talk about halting refugee programmes, immigration and even deporting citizens to stop the deaths of fewer than 200 people each year across a continent is laughable.

Insignificant? Seems to me such a large rise after years of almost no attacks is a very significant thing. Something we need to stop before it becomes a long term trend.

 

[Broken Joystick]

What the hell is happening with the US reporting of ongoing investigations? Are they deliberately breaking embargoes?

 

[cyberheater]

Those are laughable "solutions" proposed by people whose motives clearly are not just in halting terrorist attacks.

You talk about how insignificant the number of deaths have been. Each one of those deaths was a person, a family member, a mother, father, brother, sister. Each touched many lives and left a whole filled with grief.

You say their lives don't matter when folks talk about ways to protect their country from this threat.

 

[Conor_Fool]

While any death from terrorism is tragic, that really does put into perspective how insignificant the number of deaths has been.
The idea that people talk about halting refugee programmes, immigration and even deporting citizens to stop the deaths of fewer than 200 people each year across a continent is laughable.

Wow. And how about the thousands of people that will suffer from PTSD from witnessing such horrific attacks? How about the thousands upon thousands of families and friends that mourn their lost loved ones? I'm not advocating for far right policies but have some fucking perspective, it's not as black and white as you seem to think it is.

 

[Herr Schwarz]

Insignificant? Seems to me such a large rise after years of almost no attacks is a very significant thing. Something we need to stop before it becomes a long term trend.

At the expense of what though?? A few teensy civil liberties? Make things more like downtown Baghdad make a military check point every 10 miles?

I'd be interested to see the rate of car related fatalities in contrast to that terrorism graph to further put things into perspective.

 

[GoldenCrow]

Well damn that was a messed up half hour. Thankfully nothing.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

You know what saddened me when I realized, some of those "missing reports" by friends & family are fatalities where the police are attempting to contact next of kin or perhaps even trying to identify the bodies.

I said it earlier but all of those (real) missing reports are sadly going to be people who have died, there is no way anyone can still be alive but missing, in the city centre, 24 hours after the event, they would have found some means of contacting family or friends by now, or hospitals would have contacted them, if they were being treated.


My mum works in the MRI and she said the past 24 hours have been tragic, she works on one of the children's wards - I can't imagine what it must have been like.

 

[AcademicSaucer]

That 2015 - 2016 increase is nothing to laugh at

 

[ClosingADoor]

At the expense of what though?? A few teensy civil liberties? Make things more like downtown Baghdad make a military check point every 10 miles?

I'd be interested to see the rate of car related fatalities in contrast to that terrorism graph to further put things into perspective.

You can make all things sound insignificant by applying that logic. Those car deaths are little compared to cancer deaths maybe. But they are not related or relevant at all to each other. There is no need to put this in perspective, as if people are wrong about being worried for terrorist attacks.

I am not proposing anything here. I just find it very disrespectful to call these deaths insignificant.

Oh, and if you want to compare it to car fatalities. If suddenly the amount of fatalities from those rose tenfold, there is a clear problem. And we are seeing such a rise here compared to recent years.

 

[pswii60]

Wow. And how about the thousands of people that will suffer from PTSD from witnessing such horrific attacks? How about the thousands upon thousands of families and friends that mourn their lost loved ones? I'm not advocating for far right policies but have some fucking perspective, it's not as black and white as you seem to think it is.

And why do people ignore the injured and only focus on fatalities? Many of the 59 will have life changing injuries, to say the least.

 

[cybamerc]

While any death from terrorism is tragic, that really does put into perspective how insignificant the number of deaths has been.
The idea that people talk about halting refugee programmes, immigration and even deporting citizens to stop the deaths of fewer than 200 people each year across a continent is laughable.

The chart shows the number of people killed. Many more are injured or suffer from psychological trauma. Families and friends are affected. Anti-terrorism meassures are a huge drain on the economy. But sure, laugh it up.

 

[Auctopus]

I said it earlier but all of those (real) missing reports are sadly going to be people who have died, there is no way anyone can still be alive but missing, in the city centre, 24 hours after the event, they would have found some means of contacting family or friends by now, or hospitals would have contacted them, if they were being treated.

Yeah, it's a terrible likliehood. It's been nearly 24 hours now, if a person hasn't contacted you - it's most likely they're being treated in a hospital somewhere and aren't well enough to get in contact.

There's a person a few of my friends are looking for information on (I don't know him) and they've got celebrity tweets asking for information and everything and literally nothing has come up. All I can hope is that they're able to sleep tonight.

 

[Wrestlemania]

You talk about how insignificant the number of deaths have been. Each one of those deaths was a person, a family member, a mother, father, brother, sister. Each touched many lives and left a whole filled with grief.

You say their lives don't matter when folks talk about ways to protect their country from this threat.

First thing I said was that "any death from terrorism is tragic", and that extends to how it impacts those injured, related to or just witnessing the attacks. But the response needs to be proportionate, and not kowtowed to those whose motives stretch far beyond stopping terrorist attacks. Those solutions are not proportionate.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

To me that graph just shows a slow decline in other types of terrorism and a sharp increase in islamic fundamentalist type, since the turn of the century, doesn't really inspire any confidence or assurance.

 

[air jordans for dogs]

Imagine being the parent of a kid who got torn up by a fucking nail bomb and reading that their child's death is insignificant

 

[BlazingDarkness]

Imagine being the parent of a kid who got torn up by a fucking nail bomb and reading that their child's death is insignificant

Yes, apparently we must respond proportionately because terrorism was more common 30 years ago. Some people have amazing logic lol

 

[Audioboxer]

What the hell is happening with the US reporting of ongoing investigations? Are they deliberately breaking embargoes?

The rush for news outlets/stations to "break news" and get views. It gets to a point where it is legitimately careless and potentially a liability.

 

[Wrestlemania]

Imagine being the parent of a kid who got torn up by a fucking nail bomb and reading that their child's death is insignificant

Imagine if you took one small part of a post from the internet, devoid of any context, and decided to show it to a grieving parent. You'd have to be a real cunt!

Look, sorry if how I worded this has got people hung up on the "insignificant" part. Bad phrasing on my part. I was just trying to highlight the disproportionate level of response pushed by those on the extreme right that gain some traction with those less to the right after a tragic event like this.

Steps should be taken to stop attacks like this - deporting all Muslims and stopping them entering the country are not one of them. That is not a proportionate response to attacks which, while always tragic, are still incredible uncommon or unlikely, even with the recent increases.

 

[Hazzuh]

That article and the Europol document don't even give the definition of what they call "terrorist attacks" (at least I didn't see one when skimming the beginning of the doc) but my guess is they're considering pretty tame stuff.
Since they like stats so much here's one :

Its also misleading to compare terrorism in the 1970s and 1980s to what is currently happening. The IRA and ETA make up the vast majority of terror attacks from that time period (with notable exceptions like Lockerbie, Bologna, Munich), both of them were fairly well organised political groups with clearly defined aims which attacks were supposed to help achieve. I do not want to make any defence of their tactics but they were clearly driven to pursue political violence by the failure of the political system which they found themselves in.

They could be reasoned with and in the end they were reasoned with. This is totally different.

 

[Liha]

The only way to stop such attacks is to arrest all people who have links to terrorists or sympathize with them. The vast majority of the perpetrators were well known by the intelligence agencies long before their attack.

 

[jellies_two]

They could be reasoned with and in the end they were reasoned with. This is totally different.

It's not totally different from the perspective of the dead or traumatized people - which is the #1 reason given for doing something stupid like trying to kill all Muslims on sight. During the IRA bombings there was JUST as much of a sense of endless war there was nobody saying "hang in there chaps this will be over with tomorrow".

The suicide bombers have an aim and that is to get the west to over-react and drive recruitment. If you fancy living in a police state with democracy cornered in the name of national security then you listen to the alt-right idiots and their "solutions".

 

[Betty]

Steps should be taken to stop attacks like this - deporting all Muslims and stopping them entering the country are not one of them. That is not a proportionate response to attacks which, while always tragic, are still incredible uncommon or unlikely, even with the recent increases.

This isn't like car accidents or lone wolf crazies though.

We know there are groups dedicated to murdering innocent people by any means necessary at any time and that right now they are working to cause more carnage.

It's affecting people's daily lives, it's affecting our political landscape, it's affecting public events, hell let's be honest it's affecting a great portion of the world in some way or another.

Suggesting we consider these attacks the same way we do a random car crash or other uncontrollable incidents isn't going to resonate with people.

And no i'm not calling for deportations or bans and no I don't have an answer on how to solve it.

But I bet you right now if you asked people affected by terrorism what issue they're most worried about in their country, it would be putting a stop to these terrorist groups and eradicating their actions once and for all.

You can talk about logic all you want but people aren't logical when fear and threats of violence enter their lives.

 

[soxinthebox]

And why do people ignore the injured and only focus on fatalities? Many of the 59 will have life changing injuries, to say the least.

This has always bothered me about how the news reports events.

 

[Boy Wander]

Imagine if you took one small part of a post from the internet, devoid of any context, and decided to show it to a grieving parent. You'd have to be a real cunt!

Look, sorry if how I worded this has got people hung up on the "insignificant" part. Bad phrasing on my part. I was just trying to highlight the disproportionate level of response pushed by those on the extreme right that gain some traction with those less to the right after a tragic event like this.

Steps should be taken to stop attacks like this - deporting all Muslims and stopping them entering the country are not one of them. That is not a proportionate response to attacks which, while always tragic, are still incredible uncommon or unlikely, even with the recent increases.

After my rather ill judged "deport em all" rant this morning, I was thinking that they could, for instance, rather than deport them, actually prevent anyone they suspected being linked in any way to terror from leaving the UK - isolate them that way. I guess the issue here is that the jig would be up in terms of covert intelligence. The suspect would know that he/she was being tracked and would lay low. I'm not actually sure that there is an answer other than showing determination, diligence in terms of intelligence and a stiff upper lip attitude from the public to show we're not afraid.

 

[Miles Quaritch]

But I bet you right now if you asked people affected by terrorism what issue they're most worried about in their country, it would be putting a stop to these terrorist groups and eradicating their actions once and for all.

You can talk about logic all you want but people aren't logical when fear and threats of violence enter their lives.

History has a lot to teach us about not giving into those kinds of feelings, as hard as it might be.

How many times can people justify their actions after the fact by claiming they were frightened and only wanted to feel safe by 'removing' the other.

 

[azyless]

Its also misleading to compare terrorism in the 1970s and 1980s to what is currently happening.

Ehh, that's really not what I was doing. I was posting this because it's the only one I know that updates frequently and wanted to show the trend of the past few years regarding religious/non-religious terrorism.

 

[Airola]

I'd be interested to see the rate of car related fatalities in contrast to that terrorism graph to further put things into perspective.

Whenever car related fatalies stop being mainly accidents and become mainly murders, then we can compare the graphs. Until then a person putting on an explosive vest and setting it off in a public space will remain a thing that is not comparable to car accidents - not even if it's about DUI.

I would definitely be more afraid of cars if some of them suddenly became sentient with a will to murder and create terror.

 

[Kibbles]

Any details on why there's that "attack imminent!" warning? Just seems like fearmongering.

 

[shinra-bansho]

You say their lives don't matter when folks talk about ways to protect their country from this threat.

When they talk about stupid and/or nonsensical ways that won't do anything to stop attacks like this then potential lives aren't relevant; because nonsensical thinly veiled xenophobia isn't going to save lives anyway.

 

[KAP151]

Fuck. 8 years old. At the concert with her mum.

So sad.

 

[Audioboxer]

Any details on why there's that "attack imminent!" warning? Just seems like fearmongering.

Our intelligence services are not fearmongering? Watch May's address to the public.

‘The work undertaken throughout the day has revealed that there is a possibility that we cannot ignore, that there is a wider group of individuals involved in this attack,’ she said.

http://metro.co.uk/2017/05/23/terro...-to-critical-after-manchester-attack-6657355/

It hardly ever goes to critical so it's not just done to whip the public into a frenzy.

 

[Par Score]

What the hell is happening with the US reporting of ongoing investigations? Are they deliberately breaking embargoes?

The US (from the President on down) has shown itself to no longer be able to be trusted with sensitive information from its allies.

 

[DiscoJer]

This has always bothered me about how the news reports events.

I remember a lot of shrugging off of the Boston Marathon bombing, because it didn't kill many people. But it maimed 100s.

Low death totals is because medicine is pretty amazing these days.

 

[Theonik]

You can make all things sound insignificant by applying that logic. Those car deaths are little compared to cancer deaths maybe. But they are not related or relevant at all to each other. There is no need to put this in perspective, as if people are wrong about being worried for terrorist attacks.

Every death is an individual tragedy. But when you are talking about statistics such as these these deaths are insignificant. Every year about 25,000 people die in the EU to roads. We do not speak of these fatalities in quite the same way. Now that is for a number of reasons. Car fatalities are largely normalised.

We accept them as part of everyday life, and we accept them as a contract for using cars or getting near roads we don't consider them preventable though authorities do and have more than halved them since 2001.

Terror is obviously different. We televise terror attacks, we try deliberately not to normalise them. We try to think them as preventable. Reality of course is different. To suggest we must literally demonise, inconvenience or otherwise harm thousands of people in the name of preventing terrorism even at the expense of sacrificing our society's values does not sit well with my at all, it is not only not guaranteed to work but also motivates these attacks by achieving their end goal of instilling terror into the masses and forcing us to change our ways. We must seek to fight terrorism but the cost must also be considered.

And fear of being a victim of a terrorist attack is sure not rational in any sense of the word.

 

[Cromat]

What I feel people here don't appreciate at all is how long the UK has actually avoided attacks like these. The British security services deserve a massive amount of credit, they have done a fantastic job given the level of threat. It really isn't all that technically difficult to carry out an attack like this - it is only hard because of the vigilance and dedication of British intelligence (and its partners in other countries).

In a forum where the general opinion is that Snowden is a hero and the CIA/MI5/MI6/etc. are fascist scum, I think it's appropriate to give these men and women the appreciation and respect they deserve.

 

[TRUE ORDER]

Sad news indeed.
Hopefully there's no more deaths...

 

[keuja]

This is so tragic. Stay strong and united British bros, our thoughts and prayers are with you.

 

[dragonfart28]

I really don't understand how people can torture themselves over this stuff.

Obviously one wants the best for everyone involved but the constant desire from the media to fill us up with as much gut wrenching, horror stories after an event like this is counterproductive and paints a disingenuous picture of danger.

We are living in the safest time in human history but it's given the appearance of the exact opposite.

 

[Jumeira]

Insignificant? Seems to me such a large rise after years of almost no attacks is a very significant thing. Something we need to stop before it becomes a long term trend.

Correlates with when the wars started as well.

Its also misleading to compare terrorism in the 1970s and 1980s to what is currently happening. The IRA and ETA make up the vast majority of terror attacks from that time period (with notable exceptions like Lockerbie, Bologna, Munich), both of them were fairly well organised political groups with clearly defined aims which attacks were supposed to help achieve. I do not want to make any defence of their tactics but they were clearly driven to pursue political violence by the failure of the political system which they found themselves in.

They could be reasoned with and in the end they were reasoned with. This is totally different.

Not really, in what way is mass killing based on political goals not the same here? Current terrorist are clear, they call us occupiers and crusaders they broadcast our intervention as being motivation for their attacks. Its no coincidence that these attacks took place post Iraq/Afghan wars which fueled and propagated this extremist ideology.

 

[Septic360]

The mother of the 8 year old is critically injured in hospital and doesn't know the news yet.

That's awful.