# A hypothetical ISIS public execution on US soil. What would be the aftermath? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 18, 2014, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844 "2014-09-18T17:06:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/21 "2014-09-18T21:28:43Z")
> [@Cubsfan](#): > > Sorry. I didn’t realize those were ISIS. I thought those were just rogue killers, not representatives of an organized terrorist group that has explicitly said it will kill Americans on American soil. Oh, so if Islamic killers aren’t from ISIS, America doesn’t care? Seriously? ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/22 "2014-09-18T21:33:37Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Oh, so if Islamic killers aren’t from ISIS, America doesn’t care? > > Seriously? I think he is saying (correctly) that if the killers aren’t from ISIS, America would react differently than if they were. Which relates directly to the OP’s question. ---
**Author:** ![Cubsfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Cubsfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cubsfan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/23 "2014-09-18T22:28:49Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Oh, so if Islamic killers aren’t from ISIS, America doesn’t care? > > Seriously? What don’t you understand about my op? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/24 "2014-09-18T23:09:20Z")
The part I don’t get is why Islamic terrorism on American soil would cause America to flip it’s shit if and only if the Islamic terrorists are from ISIS. If they’re from Al Qaida or just random unaffiliated Islamic terrorists, we shrug our shoulders and go about our business. ---
**Author:** ![Cubsfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Cubsfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cubsfan)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2014, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/25 "2014-09-19T00:34:07Z")
Why do you keep adding to the op? You’re getting spun up over something I neither said nor implied. You need to learn how to read dude. ---
**Author:** ![ataraxy22](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ataraxy22/32/307_2.png) [@ataraxy22](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ataraxy22)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2014, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/26 "2014-09-19T01:25:53Z")
Maybe not so [hypothetical](http://www.channel4.com/news/why-is-australia-facing-a-domestic-terror-isis). ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/27 "2014-09-26T17:16:35Z")
Not so hypothetical [at all.](https://news.yahoo.com/police-woman-beheaded-oklahoma-workplace-144459291.html) Not exactly a hooded figure on videotape but… ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/28 "2014-09-26T17:25:21Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > Further to the above (at 5+ minutes), the police could not legally shoot the ISIS operatives after they had executed the victim, unless they were A) likely to commit an impending additional crime, or B) attempting to escape and become dangerous fugitives. Just as intended presidential assassins were not shot and killed by security under circumstances in which they could be neutralized and apprehended without the use of lethal force. > > So, all that could be done is for the police to arrest them and read them their rights and arraign them in court and prosecute them for homicide, with no assurance of a guilty verdict. You say this like its a bad thing. ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/29 "2014-09-26T17:48:13Z")
> [@Cubsfan](#): > > In light of the recent news about this exact scenario being thwarted in Australia it got me wondering what the aftermath would be like if it happened on US soil. > > I’m picturing something like this: > > Couple ISIS members enter the country or are already here. They go to Wal Mart and grab a random citizen, drag him or her to the middle of the store and be head them with a steak knife or something. > > What would the fall out be? How would the U.S. respond? How would local communities respond? Would every non-Hispanic with brown skin (excluding black folks obviously) suddenly become suspected sleeper cell agents for ISIS? I have to imagine life would get hard for them. > [@Lemur866](#): > > Oh, so if Islamic killers aren’t from ISIS, America doesn’t care? > > Seriously? Stick to the premise of the OP or get your own thread. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/30 "2014-09-26T17:48:19Z")
Oh, how can we fight terrorists if we have to arrest them and give them trials? Don’t you know that if they go to trial they’ll just find some technicality and they’ll be back on the streets in hours? Or they’ll plead insanity, and the namby-pamby court psychiatrists will say it wasn’t their fault, and they’ll be back on the streets as soon as they’re “cured”? Or they’ll plea bargain murder down to “ripped the tag off a mattress” and spend a few months at a country club prison? Don’t you know the American justice system doesn’t work? The only thing that works against terrorists is a cop who plays by his own rules and deals out his own brand of street justice, and who doesn’t care what those pencil-pushers back at headquarters think. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/31 "2014-09-26T17:58:06Z")
[Preach it, brother](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_former_Guantanamo_Bay_detainees_alleged_to_have_returned_to_terrorism). Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/32 "2014-09-26T18:00:33Z")
> [@gnoitall](#): > > Stick to the premise of the OP or get your own thread. I am sticking to the premise of the thread. My response was: If Isis terrorists do some terrorist shit in the US, it will be treated by the US public pretty much like all the other terrorist attacks we’ve had in the past few years. A bunch of news stories, talking heads talking on the talking boxes, a few days of public hysteria, and then back to business as usual. ---
**Author:** ![Timetrvlr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Timetrvlr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Timetrvlr)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2014, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/33 "2014-09-27T04:04:51Z")
\*\* > [@](#): > > Woman Is Beheaded in Attack at Oklahoma Food Plant \*\* Headline today in the [New York Times](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/27/us/oklahoma-man-is-said-to-behead-co-worker.html?_r=0) He was not an immigrant having been born in Oklahoma. He was also a convicted felon and a convert to radical Islam as evidenced by his recent post on his Facebook page. Do we care whether he was a disciple of ISIS or some other radical Islamic group? ---
**Author:** ![dofe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ba0ec/32.png) [@dofe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dofe)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2014, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/34 "2014-09-27T04:54:09Z")
> [@gytalf2000](#): > > I must admit, I have thought this myself – someone comes over here to do mischief, but then gets distracted and complacent, enjoying their existence in the USA. Of course, I could be wrong… it has happened before! But you’re viewing this from the perspective of someone who grew up in America and is , who is (presumably) part of the majority white population, which is much different from the perspective an minority Arab immigrant (with a different set of cultural norms and values) would experience. Sayyid Qutb, who went to to become one of the founding members of the Muslim Brotherhood, spent two years in America pursuing advanced studies. As he was already a well known educator and acted as Education Minister in Egypt before his travels in the States, he was generally treated well by his hosts. [Even so](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayyid_Qutb#Two_Years_in_America): > [@](#): > > Time in the United States, pursuing further studies in educational administration, cemented some of Qutb’s views. Over two years, he worked and studied at what was then Wilson Teachers’ College in Washington, D.C., Colorado State College for Education in Greeley, and Stanford University. He visited the major cities of the United States and spent time in Europe on his journey home. > > On his return to Egypt, Qutb published “The America that I Have Seen.” He was critical of things he had observed in the United States: its materialism, individual freedoms, economic system, racism, brutal boxing matches, “poor” haircuts, superficiality in conversations and friendships, restrictions on divorce, enthusiasm for sports, lack of artistic feeling, “animal-like” mixing of the sexes (which “went on even in churches”), and strong support for the new Israeli state. ---
**Author:** ![Do\_Not\_Taunt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/do_not_taunt/32/2968_2.png) [@Do\_Not\_Taunt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Do_Not_Taunt)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/35 "2014-09-28T01:09:18Z")
The foiled Australian plan, as I understood it, was to kidnap a random citizen off the streets of Sydney, wrap him (/her?) in an ISIS flag, behead him, film it, and release the film in the same propaganda style as the others. I would say if there is an ISIS attack (ie, the perpetrators have a credible link back to ISIS in Iraq/Syria) that consists of those elements occurring in the US homeland, you’d see an escalation of US involvement in Iraq/Syria pretty damn quickly, as well as some further steps to prevent a future attack, which would almost certainly be bad news for civil rights in the US. Now, if you start taking those elements away: no credible connection to ISIS, no ISIS flag, no propaganda video, etc, then the optics change, and the fear induced in the US populace would be reduced. If ISIS doesn’t induce sufficient fear, they might not get much of a response. The news of the Australian plot has certainly made me think ISIS is looking to goad the west into further involvement in Iraq and Syria. It seems like a miscalculation, since if US ground troops end up back there, I think al-Baghdadi is going to end up like bin Laden, but presumably ISIS doesn’t see it that way. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/36 "2014-09-28T14:40:51Z")
Obligatory [public execution soundtrack](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiA8FRH6nQc). ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/37 "2014-09-28T18:21:32Z")
> [@Timetrvlr](#): > > * * * > > Headline today in the [New York Times](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/27/us/oklahoma-man-is-said-to-behead-co-worker.html?_r=0) > > He was not an immigrant having been born in Oklahoma. He was also a convicted felon and a convert to radical Islam as evidenced by his recent post on his Facebook page. > > Do we care whether he was a disciple of ISIS or some other radical Islamic group? Judging by the Pit thread I started about him, apparently not. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/38 "2014-10-01T09:48:34Z")
> [@Cubsfan](#): > > What don’t you understand about my op? > [@Cubsfan](#): > > Why do you keep adding to the op? You’re getting spun up over something I neither said nor implied. You need to learn how to read dude. Perhaps because your OP as it stands, is full of idiotic assumptions, and people are trying to make some sort of sense out of it in order to be able to make meaningful replies. If one terrorist came to the US and murdered one person, he would be arrested and locked up, and possibly executed, just like any other murderer. It would be a very ineffective form of terrorism. Murders happen every day in America, from all sorts of motives. It is only when there is a large, spectacular attack, resulting in many deaths, such as 9/11, that there is any noticeable degree of mass panic, and consequent changes in security policy. Even something like the Boston bombing, or McVeigh’s bombing in Oklahoma City, did not make that much difference either to most people’s sense of security or to how law enforcement behaves. ---
**Author:** ![Cubsfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Cubsfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cubsfan)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/39 "2014-10-01T23:44:55Z")
What assumptions did I make? Please, enlighten me. You need to work on your reading comprehension son. People are murdered on US soil every day. That’s why I didn’t ask what would happen if someone came to the US and murdered someone. People DON’T stage public executions in the name of terrorist organizations on US soil. If you can’t see the difference between that and what you described you’re a moron and should just move on to the next cat thread or go play some thread games. ---
**Author:** ![Do\_Not\_Taunt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/do_not_taunt/32/2968_2.png) [@Do\_Not\_Taunt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Do_Not_Taunt)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844/40 "2014-10-02T02:54:24Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Perhaps because your OP as it stands, is full of idiotic assumptions, and people are trying to make some sort of sense out of it in order to be able to make meaningful replies. > > If one terrorist came to the US and murdered one person, he would be arrested and locked up, and possibly executed, just like any other murderer. It would be a very ineffective form of terrorism. Murders happen every day in America, from all sorts of motives. It is only when there is a large, spectacular attack, resulting in many deaths, such as 9/11, that there is any noticeable degree of mass panic, and consequent changes in security policy. Even something like the Boston bombing, or McVeigh’s bombing in Oklahoma City, did not make that much difference either to most people’s sense of security or to how law enforcement behaves. No, they didn’t, but the Washington Sniper had a pretty serious outsized impact relative to the amount of damage they really did (10 killed in a year where there were 264 homicides in DC alone). The symbolism is more important than the actual metrics when it comes to the effect. If it’s clear that this is linked to ISIS and there’s a credible suggestion it’s going to keep happening, even a single beheading on the US mainland could have enormous effects. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hypothetical-isis-public-execution-on-us-soil-what-would-be-the-aftermath/698844.md?page=3)