<p>^^^</p>
<p>That conflict is still very much in the headlines, including the recent blocked flotilla. </p>
<p>However, I agree that the element of surprise for any of the many world wide conflicts is relevant.</p>
<p>Now the news is saying at least 80 were killed at the camp.</p>
<p>It’s just horrific. Those poor teens and their families.</p>
<p>My S has contacted his friends in Oslo. Most of them are college aged. They are all staying up very late facebooking. Apparently, they are all afraid to go out. Kind of like our 9/11 experience. Their parents have been understandably frantic to get ahold of them. I just hope that today was the only event.</p>
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<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/23/world/europe/23oslo.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/23/world/europe/23oslo.html</a></p>
<p>Where is the idea that Muslims are involved in this coming from? The Norwegian guy they have arrested is not reported to have any connections to Islam.</p>
<p>Early on, there were reports of extremist jihadist groups claiming responsibility. I know when I heard about it on NPR, at around noon PST, that was reported. It later turned out that those groups didn’t mean it. Now it looks like it was someone homegrown. It has been described as Norway’s Oklahoma City Bombing, not their 9/11. It is incredibly tragic. The tales from the camp are simply horrific.</p>
<p>This tragedy points to why I’ve always supported airport screening that is either a) random; or b) triggered by behavior. Screening or being on the lookout only for people who look like this or that type of person or religious believer, would not have picked up a McVey or this blond, blue-eyed monster. </p>
<p>This wouldn’t have been stopped by airport screening, obviously. But it points out that with easy access to weapons which have a large-kill capacity, stereotypes just don’t work.</p>
<p>The perpetrator is apparently a right-wing Christian fundamentalist, as per his personal website. (via BBC) I would wager that he is also quite disturbed.</p>
<p>People’s eagerness to assume that any horrendous act of violence must be the work of Islamic fundamentalists is incredibly sad.</p>
<p>I am so sad to hear this news. My heart goes out to the families and friends of those at the camp as well as those affected in the city where the bomb went off. For the man that caused this tragedy, I hope we learn enough about his background and mental state to know how to help others like him so incidents like this can be averted in the future. What must be going through one’s mind to decide that this is the way to state your political or religious views? (I don’t need an answer for that question.) Norway, we’re thinking of you.</p>
<p>I am sad to say that I have become somewhat jaded to bombings and threats of bombings, but there is something about this summer camp shooting that has me feeling as sick as I felt when I heard about columbine</p>
<p>Just devastating for that country. I’m saddened by the capacity for senseless violence we seem to have as humans.</p>
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<p>If you look at the statistics, the perpetrators of these violent acts are more likely to be muslims, at least, in the last 20 years. Since IRA stopped their their campaign against the British, almost all terrorist acts in the western world have been committed by people of the muslim faith.</p>
<p>I cannot begin to even understand this. It just won’t sink in. My prayers to those in Norway.</p>
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<p>Right, and so now the news is covering this guy as such in the headlines. I think we should emphasize this now. Moreover, however, it speaks to the fact that it is nearly impossible to expect anyone to just use the term ‘terrorist’ without a qualifier to loosely capture from what angle their terror reigns. This man is no more in association with fundamentalist Christians (let alone Christians of any persuasion), than an “islamic terrorist” is associated with Muslims or the Islamic faith. </p>
<p>It would drive me bonkers if I was Muslim and being associated with terrorists because of basic and sheer ignorance. The problem, as i see it, is not the misuse of terminology however; but a lack of general education, world knowledge, and thinking skills on the part of just too many Americans.</p>
<p>You can hardly blame people for assuming it was an islamist terrorist attack, this happened in peaceful and stable Norway where no known native terrorist organisation exists. Norway had after all been threatened (quite recently) by al-Qaeda with an attack, so its not altogether surprising people jumped the gun.</p>
<p>^ I agree. I was just commenting on the use of the religious term in front of the word “terrorist”.</p>
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<p>People did not jump the gun or speculated wildly. </p>
<p>The original reports contained stories about a group of “pacifists” claiming responsibility. I used the terms “pacifists” as some seem to have a problem with the more accurate description of such groups.</p>
<p>Actually a lot did. I’m talking about facebook and twitter speculation.</p>
<p>OMG tega, your number of posts…</p>
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<p>I remember that after the Oklahoma City bombing, it was thought at first to be the work of Muslim terrorists. It seemed impossible that one of our own would do something like that to other Americans. That was something that “they” did.</p>
<p>We were wrong…</p>