They have higher standards.

No, you haven’t. I have shown that it was terrorism, even by your definition though. You don’t care and just keep adding on extra stipulations that aren’t in your definition.

He never took credit for that violence, in fact, he tried to pretend it wasn’t him

Nowhere in either definition, at all. Complete non sequitor.

He never made any demands

Nowhere in either definition, at all. Complete non sequitor.

Just like the location is irrelevant. Just like every extra stipulation you pull out of your ass is irrelevant.

Yes. It’s obvious that you’re acting smarmy to cover the gaps whenever you have nothing, to cover all the holes in your argument. It’s like you think if you just act smug, people won’t notice when you’re cornered and have no actual response.

It doesn’t work. It’s transparent. You’re not actually covering up the holes in your reasoning, you’re just demonstrating that you don’t care about how many holes there are in your reasoning, because you’re intellectually dishonest.

I find it frustrating that so many communities are just for news articles. Look, I’m terminally politics-brained, but you’ll never get anywhere if you’re always just reacting to the current thing. There’s not really a place for higher level discussion or for people to share thoughtful, original ideas. The result is thousands of the same arguments on the same three topics screaming the same talking points at each other over and over. And it seems like that’s all people want.

Really more of a frustration with people in general. Wish people were more curious about the world.

God, you’re so smarmy when you can’t think of an actual point. Do you not realize how transparent it is?

It was the only objection you raised at that point, so yes, it was your entire argument. Whether you had some super-secret argument in your head that you weren’t saying isn’t relevant to the argument you actually made.

I love how you simultaneously claim I’m strawmanning you and defend the positions I’m criticizing.

No, people don’t have to be afraid for it to be terrorism, no, the location isn’t relevant to whether it’s terrorism (we’ve been over this, a bomb that goes off on a plane over international waters is still terrorism), no, the perpetrator doesn’t have to take credit for it. None of those criteria are included anywhere in either your made up definition or the actual definition.

But again, it doesn’t matter because you’re a fundamentally unreasonable person. You don’t care about logic or evidence or consistency. You’ll just respond to this with another meaningless snipe like “oNlY iF yOu DoN’t KnOw WhAt A t Is,” because that’s the highest capacity for thought that you possess.

You said “Terrorism is the use of violence against the general public to change behaviours or policies.” Location is not in that definition. Whether people are terrified (which the Romulans were) is not included in that definition. Whether the perpetrator takes credit is not included in that definition. How on earth can you not see how completely full of shit you are when you keep adding new, arbitrary stipulations to exclude this one instance of terrorism??

Literally every single component of the definition I cited fits Garak’s actions to a T. You kept insisting that I’m “expanding” the definition to include anything, yet completely ignored the question I asked you on every single example you brought up.

It doesn’t matter. One comment you say it’s not terrorism because people “didn’t seem terrified.” Another comment you claim it doesn’t count as terrorism because of the location where it happened! I cut your arguments down again and again and you don’t care. You will just shift your position over and over again, denying that you ever held the previous one even though the comments are right there. You’re a completely shameless troll. You have to know how full of shit you are, I don’t know who you think you’re fooling.

Because The Atlantic cannot publish a single article without including a brain-meltingly awful take in it.

I already refuted like three of your positions. Every time you shift the goalposts and call it a “strawman” and if I refute your new position you’ll do the same, because you’re a clown.

McCarthyism to the tenth power

The main job of a conservative influencer is to come up with new ways of saying, “I think we should do the Holocaust” that are palatable to suburbanites.

What a shit take. That’s like saying, “I don’t know how the Church thinks the Inquisition will go when they’ve deviated so far from Jesus’ teachings themselves,” or “I don’t know how Hitler thinks gassing the Jews will work when he has Jewish ancestors himself.”

It doesn’t fucking matter. They can pick whatever label they like, communist, heretic, immigrant, Jew, whatever, and apply it to whoever they feel like and not apply it to whoever they don’t feel like. You are an absolute rube if you think this sort of “gotcha” will slow them down in any way, you’re literally accepting their framing by doing that.

I’m not “giving up trying to defend my point of view.” I’ve already demonstrated that you’re full of shit on multiple levels and you just keep throwing shit at the wall hoping something sticks and I’m tired of proving you wrong over and over again.

I’m done engaging with your stupid bullshit. If you want to keep talking nonsense, tell it to someone else. I find it hard to believe how anyone else on the planet would agree with you.

Yeah like both Trump and Biden won in big competitive primaries with a lot of candidates younger than them. I think part of the reason we have so many old politicians is that young candidates feel more like positively asserting the future of their party, and nobody really likes the futures they’re asserting. Without that vision, the status quo wins out by default.

I was like that as a kid but then even once I became sympathetic I spent so long stupidly being like, “my individual actions won’t make a difference so why bother” and finally I realized how, for me, eating meat had become an expression of helplessness, an admission of defeat towards the cruelties of the world. Even if it is a small thing (although countless animals can be saved over a lifetime), it turns out asserting control over your own choices and acting in line with your beliefs is actually really important for mental health!

And the moment I made the leap, like literally the week of, I realized that every argument that had held me back from doing it was complete bullshit. It only seemed reasonable because I didn’t want to change my habits, so once there were no longer any habits to protect, I could suddenly see straight through them.

That’s exactly what the DS9 team says happened.

That’s literally just a clip from the episode lmao. That’s not “the DS9 team” saying it wasn’t terrorism.

Terrorism is the use of violence against the general public to change behaviours or policies.

Here’s the definition google gives me:

Terrorism is the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, to instill fear and coerce governments or societies to achieve political, religious, or ideological goals. While no single, universally accepted definition exists, it commonly involves premeditated violence, targets non-combatants, and seeks to influence a broader audience beyond the immediate victims

Every single element of that definition is met by Garak’s actions. You’re trying to shift definitions (both from the generally accepted meaning, and from your earlier claims where you said that it wasn’t terrorism because people “didn’t seem terrified”) and arbitrarily claiming targeting politicians somehow makes it not count. There is absolutely no requirement that the victims of an act of terrorism must not be political figures.

Nobody is going to be afraid that the next attack is going to hurt them because they’re not likely to be flying out of Romulan space on a diplomatic mission

Again, complete nonsense. It’s not about whether people are “afraid the next attack is going to hurt them.” That has absolutely nothing to do with it. In your mind, do you think rural farmers in Montana watched an attack on the financial center of New York and thought, “Oh my god, they could’ve just as easily decided to go after my farm!”

And again - the Romulans literally do think that the next attack is going to hurt them! That’s why they go to war with the Dominion! Because the point of Garak’s actions is to convince them that the Dominion is a threat to Romulus itself! Not just shuttles transporting politicians!

You are wrong on so many levels that even if your completely incorrect premises were true, you’d still be wrong!

In addition, if Garrack is a terrorist, what are his demands as a terrorist? When does he make it clear that he’s behind the attack, and that similar attacks will happen unless his aims are achieved?

None of those are requirements for terrorism, even by your own definition.

What Garrack did isn’t terrorism. It was a false flag assassination.

What Bin Laden did wasn’t terrorism, it was hijacking. Or is it possible that a thing can be both terrorism and another thing at the same time?

His goal wasn’t even to cause fear in anyone. It was to get the Romulans to believe the evidence he planted that the Dominion were planning to invade Romulus.

And he wanted them to believe that evidence in order to cause fear that the Dominion would attack them.

There’s nothing about what happened that even comes close to terrorism.

You have to be trolling, there is no possible way for you to be this dumb. Even if you wanted to argue that it “technically” isn’t terrorism by some bullshit made-up pedantry, it’s obviously at least “close” to terrorism.

You are

Wow, we’ve reached “I know you are but what am I.” While once again completely ignoring a valid point on no basis. You literally said, “So, he created terror among the Romulans? They sure didn’t seem terrified to me,” and now you’re doubling down on calling arguing against that a “strawman.”

No, he was a senator, his crew were the private crew of a senator.

And? That in no way makes them not count as “the public.”

Absolutely insane that your argument here is “it doesn’t count as terrorism because he targeted a political figure.” Targeting a political figure makes it more obviously terrorism!

So, he created terror among the Romulans? They sure didn’t seem terrified to me.

Your whole argument was “it’s not terrorism because they weren’t terrified.”

Whack that straw man, go for it. You’ll defeat it soon!

Absolute clown.

Exactly, so no members of the public were harmed

Both he and his crew were members of the public.

Garak wasn’t trying to evoke fear of terrorism in the public

Ah, so now it has to be specifically “fear of terrorism in the public” to qualify. This is ridiculous, I’m not going to engage with these shifted goalposts.

That’s not terrorism. That’s just fear of a war or betrayal.

Your whole argument was “it’s not terrorism because they weren’t terrified.” Now you’re admitting that it did, in fact, cause them to be afraid.

Was the Romulan senator on a space liner with lots of other passengers, or was he in his own private shuttle?

He was in his private shuttle, with his crew and escort.

Again, terrorism is about a fear that someone who is merely a member of the general public might get killed or injured.

Which was the explicit goal of Garak’s actions. To make the general public afraid the Dominion was going to kill them.

Blowing up someone’s private yacht is not terrorism because no ordinary member of the public thinks “that could have been my yacht!”

Got it, so 9/11 wasn’t terrorism because I don’t work in a skyscraper.

This is complete nonsense. If they can target a high profile figure, they can target anyone. Furthermore, a major defining factor of terrorism is trying to advance a political agenda, and targeting a senator to draw the Romulans into a war could not possibly be more in line with that.

A mob hit on another mobster is terrorism?

Is that seeking to evoke fear in the public to advance a political agenda, like Garak was?

The shootout at the OK Corral was terrorism?

Is that seeking to evoke fear in the public to advance a political agenda, like Garak was?

A 18th century duel is terrorism?

Is that seeking to evoke fear in the public to advance a political agenda, like Garak was?

A bullfighter getting killed by a bull is terrorism?

Is that seeking to evoke fear in the public to advance a political agenda, like Garak was?