Farid AbdelNour
Farid Abdel-Nour
Remarks delivered by Farid Abdel-Nour on panel entitled “Can we Defeat Terrorism?” at the Hansen Institute for World Peace and Hostler Institute on World Affairs Lecture series at SDSU, on May 4, 2006.
The Moral Uselessness of Terrorism
In my remarks I will focus on how we use the term terrorism and why it is so difficult to define. I argue that the very term serves a function of moral obfuscation.
Defining terrorism would not be so difficult if when we used it we meant to describe a particular method of using violence. If when we used the term we meant something analogous to what we mean when we use terms like “war” or “killing” there would not be such controversy surrounding its definition. When we say “war” we try to capture with that word a political phenomenon, just as when we say killing we try to capture a social phenomenon. In both of these cases we leave open the question of whether we approve of the war in question or whether we approve of the specific act of killing. We can qualify the term war by saying “this is a just war” or “this is an unjust war”. Similarly we can qualify the term “killing” by saying “this is a justifiable act of killing” (in self defense for example), or we can say “this is not a justifiable act of killing” in which case it might constitute murder. We understand war and killing as phenomena in the world about which, depending on circumstances we can make different types of moral judgment.
This is not the case with the way we use the term “terrorism.” We do not use the term to denote a phenomenon about any particular instance of which we can ponder if it is just or unjust. We use the term terrorism in a way that already includes a final value judgment. This complicates the question of defining it. It means that in our political discourse we do not use the term terrorism in a way that is analogous to the way we use war or killing. We use it instead in a way that is analogous to our use of the term “evil.” In other words, when we label an act or a person as terrorist we do something analogous to what we do when we label someone or something as evil.
The term evil is not so much used to capture and denote a clearly identifiable political or social phenomenon. Rather, it is used to denote something about the relationship between the person who is using the term and the one who is being labeled by it.
The terms “terrorist” and “evil” have one very important feature in common. They are never used to describe self. They always describe an Other. People might say “I am a sinner,” “I am a criminal,” “I am a murderer,” “I have broken the law,” “I have made a mistake,” but no one says “I am evil.” However it flows relatively easily off our tongues to say “you are evil” or “he or she is evil.” The same applies to terrorism. Anytime anyone is accused of terrorism they respond with “I am not the terrorist, they are the real terrorists” (usually pointing to ones identified with his accusers).
No on says about him or herself “I am a terrorist” or about his or her group “we are terrorists.” This tells us something about how this term functions in our political discourse and why it is not only difficult, but should prove to be impossible to define in any way that would have universal credibility.
Since the term terrorism always denotes actions that self would never perform, it serves to help define who “we are not” and how “we” are distinct from others (no matter who the “we” is). The reason that a universal definition of terrorism is difficult is that each group will want the definition to exclude the types of actions that they themselves engage in or would like to feel entitled to engage in. They would each like the definition of terrorism to include actions that others against whom they define themselves engage in.
Let us consider a couple of potential definitions of terrorism that capture the value judgment that is always wrapped into the term and hidden inside it, and see how these attempted definitions would be hard for us to accept because they do not allow for a moral gulf to separate “us “ from “the terrorists.”
We can begin with a definition I heard in this room during this lecture series that went something like this: “we follow the rules of war—the terrorists do not. This is what distinguishes us from the terrorists.” At the time when I heard this definition, I was very offended because the speaker, who was a guest in our country, was insulting us all by implying that the U.S. is a terrorist state. He must have been aware of the Guantanamo Bay detention center and the violations of the rules of war that are involved. He must have also been aware of the violations of the rules of war in the Abu Ghreib prison. Nonetheless he had the audacity to suggest that by violating the rules of war (something we do on a regular basis) we would be grouped as terrorists.
Such an attempt at a definition cannot be accurate because it does not serve to show how we are not terrorists. So we should try to work with a more “refined” definition.
Perhaps, as innumerable public figures keep repeating ad nauseam, the difference between the terrorists and us is that “we do not target civilians, whereas the terrorists do.” This attempt at a definition requires some careful interpreting.
First, it cannot mean that the terrorists kill civilians whereas we do not, because of course we kill civilians all the time and we kill them in large numbers. Consider for example that during the first forty-two days of the Iraq war, U.S. and coalition forces killed 7312 civilians, more than double the number of civilians killed on September 11th.
Anyone who tries to define terrorism as the killing of civilians is someone with bad intentions towards us. Such a person would be trying to label us as terrorists.
This means that we must refine our interpretation of the targeting civilians definition. We might instead interpret it as follows: the difference between the terrorists and us is that we kill civilians only by mistake, that is unintentionally, while terrorists kill civilians intentionally. I am afraid that someone who offers such an interpretation must also have bad intentions towards us. Because of course we kill civilians intentionally all the time. For example, when our troops identify a city such as Fallujah for attack, they know and we know that cities include civilians (including women and children). The attack on Fallujah in April 2004 yielded 300 children and women dead (aside from any civilian men). It was no secret that Fallujah contained civilians, it was bombed to the ground nonetheless, intentionally killing civilians. When our troops assassinated an al-Qaeda operative in Afghanistan several weeks ago they took a number of civilians with him, intentionally, knowingly. He was in a private home where civilians tend to live.
This means that terrorism cannot involve simply killing civilians intentionally. That cannot be the way to define terrorism. We must try to refine our interpretation of targeting civilians even further. Perhaps by saying that we do not target civilians we mean that we only intentionally kill civilians when we suspect them of being in bad company, whereas terrorists intentionally kill civilians even when they do not suspect them of being in bad company.
I think one could go on—what does it mean to be in bad company, to suspect someone of being in bad company? What does it mean to try to assassinate people we have vague suspicions about? But there is no need to go on. You get the point.
At best, the difference between the people we label as terrorist and us is a moral hair-split. At worst, any distinction in the types of behavior we engage in and that they engage in is unsustainable. Either way, we see that the term “terrorist” does not help us distinguish between different types of behavior in any morally significant sense. Its main function seems to be to convince us that there are evil others who are unlike us in every respect, against whom we can define ourselves, and at whom we can look with self-righteous indignation.
The term terrorism serves to obfuscate the fact that the difference between those we label as terrorists and ourselves is not a moral gulf at all, but at best a moral hair, or perhaps there is no moral difference at all.
Remarks delivered by Farid Abdel-Nour on panel entitled “Can we Defeat Terrorism?” at the Hansen Institute for World Peace and Hostler Institute on World Affairs Lecture series at SDSU, on May 4, 2006.
The Moral Uselessness of Terrorism
In my remarks I will focus on how we use the term terrorism and why it is so difficult to define. I argue that the very term serves a function of moral obfuscation.
Defining terrorism would not be so difficult if when we used it we meant to describe a particular method of using violence. If when we used the term we meant something analogous to what we mean when we use terms like “war” or “killing” there would not be such controversy surrounding its definition. When we say “war” we try to capture with that word a political phenomenon, just as when we say killing we try to capture a social phenomenon. In both of these cases we leave open the question of whether we approve of the war in question or whether we approve of the specific act of killing. We can qualify the term war by saying “this is a just war” or “this is an unjust war”. Similarly we can qualify the term “killing” by saying “this is a justifiable act of killing” (in self defense for example), or we can say “this is not a justifiable act of killing” in which case it might constitute murder. We understand war and killing as phenomena in the world about which, depending on circumstances we can make different types of moral judgment.
This is not the case with the way we use the term “terrorism.” We do not use the term to denote a phenomenon about any particular instance of which we can ponder if it is just or unjust. We use the term terrorism in a way that already includes a final value judgment. This complicates the question of defining it. It means that in our political discourse we do not use the term terrorism in a way that is analogous to the way we use war or killing. We use it instead in a way that is analogous to our use of the term “evil.” In other words, when we label an act or a person as terrorist we do something analogous to what we do when we label someone or something as evil.
The term evil is not so much used to capture and denote a clearly identifiable political or social phenomenon. Rather, it is used to denote something about the relationship between the person who is using the term and the one who is being labeled by it.
The terms “terrorist” and “evil” have one very important feature in common. They are never used to describe self. They always describe an Other. People might say “I am a sinner,” “I am a criminal,” “I am a murderer,” “I have broken the law,” “I have made a mistake,” but no one says “I am evil.” However it flows relatively easily off our tongues to say “you are evil” or “he or she is evil.” The same applies to terrorism. Anytime anyone is accused of terrorism they respond with “I am not the terrorist, they are the real terrorists” (usually pointing to ones identified with his accusers).
No on says about him or herself “I am a terrorist” or about his or her group “we are terrorists.” This tells us something about how this term functions in our political discourse and why it is not only difficult, but should prove to be impossible to define in any way that would have universal credibility.
Since the term terrorism always denotes actions that self would never perform, it serves to help define who “we are not” and how “we” are distinct from others (no matter who the “we” is). The reason that a universal definition of terrorism is difficult is that each group will want the definition to exclude the types of actions that they themselves engage in or would like to feel entitled to engage in. They would each like the definition of terrorism to include actions that others against whom they define themselves engage in.
Let us consider a couple of potential definitions of terrorism that capture the value judgment that is always wrapped into the term and hidden inside it, and see how these attempted definitions would be hard for us to accept because they do not allow for a moral gulf to separate “us “ from “the terrorists.”
We can begin with a definition I heard in this room during this lecture series that went something like this: “we follow the rules of war—the terrorists do not. This is what distinguishes us from the terrorists.” At the time when I heard this definition, I was very offended because the speaker, who was a guest in our country, was insulting us all by implying that the U.S. is a terrorist state. He must have been aware of the Guantanamo Bay detention center and the violations of the rules of war that are involved. He must have also been aware of the violations of the rules of war in the Abu Ghreib prison. Nonetheless he had the audacity to suggest that by violating the rules of war (something we do on a regular basis) we would be grouped as terrorists.
Such an attempt at a definition cannot be accurate because it does not serve to show how we are not terrorists. So we should try to work with a more “refined” definition.
Perhaps, as innumerable public figures keep repeating ad nauseam, the difference between the terrorists and us is that “we do not target civilians, whereas the terrorists do.” This attempt at a definition requires some careful interpreting.
First, it cannot mean that the terrorists kill civilians whereas we do not, because of course we kill civilians all the time and we kill them in large numbers. Consider for example that during the first forty-two days of the Iraq war, U.S. and coalition forces killed 7312 civilians, more than double the number of civilians killed on September 11th.
Anyone who tries to define terrorism as the killing of civilians is someone with bad intentions towards us. Such a person would be trying to label us as terrorists.
This means that we must refine our interpretation of the targeting civilians definition. We might instead interpret it as follows: the difference between the terrorists and us is that we kill civilians only by mistake, that is unintentionally, while terrorists kill civilians intentionally. I am afraid that someone who offers such an interpretation must also have bad intentions towards us. Because of course we kill civilians intentionally all the time. For example, when our troops identify a city such as Fallujah for attack, they know and we know that cities include civilians (including women and children). The attack on Fallujah in April 2004 yielded 300 children and women dead (aside from any civilian men). It was no secret that Fallujah contained civilians, it was bombed to the ground nonetheless, intentionally killing civilians. When our troops assassinated an al-Qaeda operative in Afghanistan several weeks ago they took a number of civilians with him, intentionally, knowingly. He was in a private home where civilians tend to live.
This means that terrorism cannot involve simply killing civilians intentionally. That cannot be the way to define terrorism. We must try to refine our interpretation of targeting civilians even further. Perhaps by saying that we do not target civilians we mean that we only intentionally kill civilians when we suspect them of being in bad company, whereas terrorists intentionally kill civilians even when they do not suspect them of being in bad company.
I think one could go on—what does it mean to be in bad company, to suspect someone of being in bad company? What does it mean to try to assassinate people we have vague suspicions about? But there is no need to go on. You get the point.
At best, the difference between the people we label as terrorist and us is a moral hair-split. At worst, any distinction in the types of behavior we engage in and that they engage in is unsustainable. Either way, we see that the term “terrorist” does not help us distinguish between different types of behavior in any morally significant sense. Its main function seems to be to convince us that there are evil others who are unlike us in every respect, against whom we can define ourselves, and at whom we can look with self-righteous indignation.
The term terrorism serves to obfuscate the fact that the difference between those we label as terrorists and ourselves is not a moral gulf at all, but at best a moral hair, or perhaps there is no moral difference at all.
posted by Dipak K. Gupta at 4:18 PM
2 Comments:
In this clever analysis, AbdelNour ends up with an exoneration of the profoundly evil and repulsive character of terrorism... by the real terrorists of the world (the overwhelming majority of whom happen to be Palestinian, or originate from other Muslim countries). By establishing a moral equivalence between the accidental killing of civilians by US forces and intentional slaughtering of civilians by terrorists, he is in fact excusing and morally justifying the latter. This is a rather repulsive moral construct. Even when he has it almost right (when he says "Perhaps by saying that we do not target civilians we mean that we only intentionally kill civilians when we suspect them of being in bad company, whereas terrorists intentionally kill civilians even when they do not suspect them of being in bad company".), he refrains from defining what he means by "bad company", leaving the reader to assume that it is an arbitrary designation leading to unavoidable (but automatically reprehensible) civilian casualties. Therefore, the notion of "bad company" needs to be revisited and stripped of its highly subjective (and manipulative) content. Every adversary is "bad company" for the other side. That's obvious. What is less obvious, and that's the part AbdelNour conveniently avoids to examine, is whether either side is in the presence of legitimate and lawful targets. Terrorists never ponder this question: their objective is strictly to spread terror (hence the name) at random, making everybody feel unsafe, and from their perspective any casualties will do, including women, babies and elderly people. By contrast, US forces follow rules that define the targets they are authorized to attack, even if these lawful targets make it a point to hide like cowards behind their own women and children. International law gives the military commander in the field in such cases the authority to weigh in the respective military advantages (say take out Bin Laden) vs. the collateral damage that the attack will probably entail (say kill his family with him as the only way to eliminate him). The difference between the two is like night and day. But AbdelNour would have us believe that both approaches are the same shade of grey. They are not. His rationalization, leading to the acceptability of true terrorism ("they have the right to do it because we're doing the same thing") is nothing short of appalling.
J.J. Surbeck
This essay was delivered in response to the question "Can we defeat terrorism?"
Sadly, the answer is apparently no, and the author argues further that we can't even define terrorism.
If this passes as a rational argument for an SDSU professor, then students there are being poorly served indeed.
When Islamic terrorists slammed planeloads of civilians into the World Trade Center, we didn't need mushy arguments from wishy washy professorial types to tell us what it was or was not. When Islamic terrorists attacked London commuters trying to get to work, it was clear. When Islamic terrorists in Israel slit the throat of a four month old baby girl, it was clear then as well.
Mr. AbdelNour, why don't you at least have the minimal moral courage to be honest about your position, which is that YOU feel there is no difference between "us" and terrorists. In speaking of yourself, you may be correct. But don't you dare include me or the majority of free people in your repulsive "us." Because I assure you we have no problem identifying acts of terror. That you do is your own moral failing.
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