# The Third Jihad-recommended viewing **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 16, 2010, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953 "2010-07-16T18:28:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/241 "2010-07-23T01:20:05Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Therefore: > starting set… Americans… Dogs > smaller benign subset… Right Wingers…Pit bulls > smaller still dangerous subset…Radical Right Wingers… Rabid pit bulls > > Or… > > Americans : Right Wingers : Radical Right Wingers :: Dogs : Pit Bulls : Rabid Pit Bulls > > Gotta be wary of them Right Wingers. > > Failing that, we get more occurrences of the Alfred P. Murrah building, Atlanta Olympics bombing, etc. Couple of problems with this. First, I’m not sure it’s fair to attribute the two bombings you mention to the same, unifying reason. The two incidents are unrelated and have no ties to a single ideology. If they did, that would be helpful and make your analogy better. Second, going from your Step 1 to Step 2 is not as helpful. In my example we cut the pool from 300 million to under 2.5 million. Your example cuts it to merely 50% or so, though that is a good step if you were looking to stop an existing threat, like abortion clinic bombing, which do have a unifying ideology. Third, your final term, “radical right wingers” is more ambiguous" than the understanding we have of Muslim radicals. But if you’d like to define it some, it may work. So, I don’t find your analogy offensive, just not as helpful. And taking the example of abortion bombers, it would make perfect sense to me if the first sieve is that of “Christian”. Religious based, but both logical and sensible as a first narrowing. If you stopped there, it would be almost useless, as this is a Christian majority country. BUt as a first step, sound right. Unless you’d like to argue that if we started out wanting to stop the bombing of abortion clinics we should look equally as hard at Buddhists, Quakers, and Atheists. Do you? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/242 "2010-07-23T01:34:32Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Couple of problems with this. First, I’m not sure it’s fair to attribute the two bombings you mention to the same, unifying reason. I never said it was. You just need to be wary of the groups that generate that sort of hatred and violence and I have provided that equation based on your example. If you want to wiggle and squirm away from that position, it is fine with me. > [@magellan01](#): > > So, I don’t find your analogy offensive, just not as helpful. And taking the example of abortion bombers, it would make perfect sense to me if the first sieve is that of “Christian”. Religious based, but both logical and sensible as a first narrowing. If you stopped there, it would be almost useless, as this is a Christian majority country. BUt as a first step, sound right. I have said nothing about Abortion clinic bombers. Changing the threat from Right Wing bombers to Abortion clinic bombers looks like an attempt to change the game to keep your point safe. There may be more or fewer gradations that need to be filtered for each scenario, but you have insisted that being wary of “muslims” is the first step and so being wary of people on the political Right must be the first step–unless you want to back away from that sort of claim? ---
**Author:** ![42fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/b487fb/32.png) [@42fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/42fish)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/243 "2010-07-23T01:40:57Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Third, your final term, “radical right wingers” is more ambiguous" than the understanding we have of Muslim radicals. But if you’d like to define it some, it may work. How about this\*: do you think we should have law enforcement agencies ask the various Tea Party groups for membership lists (kind of how you want them getting membership lists from mosques), then have them do their magical “Step 2: ???” to determine if any of them warrant watching as potential Timothy McVeighs? \*Apologies to tomndebb for stepping on his/her/their(?) toes ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/244 "2010-07-23T01:57:22Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > I never said it was. You just need to be wary of the groups that generate that sort of hatred and violence and I have provided that equation based on your example. If you want to wiggle and squirm away from that position, it is fine with me. Not exactly. As I’ve mentioned earlier, the size of the group matters. If we’re talking about brown-haired people here in the U.S., that filter wouldn’t be helpful. The smaller the group the more helpful the exercise is. No wiggling or squirming. Check the thread for yourself. > [@tomndebb](#): > > I have said nothing about Abortion clinic bombers. Changing the threat from Right Wing bombers to Abortion clinic bombers looks like an attempt to change the game to keep your point safe. I was improving on your analogy. I think it a safe bet to assume that if an abortion clinic is bombed, particularly as part of a pattern, that the bomber will be a Christian. I was demonstrating that it would then be more analogous to what I offered and that starting with the pool, “Christians”, would make good sense. The same way that if you start out wanting to prevent terrorist deaths by Islamic jihadists, that it makes perfect sense to assume that the perpetrators will be Muslim. > [@tomndebb](#): > > There may be more or fewer gradations that need to be filtered for each scenario, but you have insisted that being wary of “muslims” is the first step and so being wary of people on the political Right must be the first step–unless you want to back away from that sort of claim? One big difference: we know that radical Islamists are targeting us. Every expert I’ve heard on TV, from both sides, and as was indicated in the 9/11 report, it’s not a matter of if, but when. Since then there have been numerous attacks and failed attacks. There seems to be no commensurate threat from Christians bombing abortion clinics or anything else. There is also the scale of the the attack to be concerned with. If a successful attack would result in a death or two at a time, I’m not sure we could do much about it. BUt we have to remember, the body count on 9/11 was MUCH lower than they thought it would be. And the body count from a dirty bomb or a suitcase nuke would be 10 to 100 times greater. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/245 "2010-07-23T01:58:58Z")
> [@42fish](#): > > How about this\*: do you think we should have law enforcement agencies ask the various Tea Party groups for membership lists (kind of how you want them getting membership lists from mosques), then have them do their magical “Step 2: ???” to determine if any of them warrant watching as potential Timothy McVeighs? No. For the reasons mentioned above. ---
**Author:** ![Trepa\_Mayfield](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@Trepa\_Mayfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trepa_Mayfield)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/246 "2010-07-23T02:25:31Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > There may be more or fewer gradations that need to be filtered for each scenario, but you have insisted that being wary of “muslims” is the first step and so being wary of people on the political Right must be the first step–unless you want to back away from that sort of claim? I’m pretty sure he already backed away from that claim. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/247 "2010-07-23T02:32:57Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Third, your final term, “radical right wingers” is more ambiguous" than the understanding we have of Muslim radicals. I don’t think that’s necessarily true. Muslim radicals are not all of one idealogy or line of practices. They strike me as pretty similar in ambiguousness. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/248 "2010-07-23T04:12:56Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Let’s, for a minute, say you’re correct and that terrorism defined more broadly is a threat we need to be concerned with. Wouldn’t the next step be to try to define that terrorism more narrowly so we can address it. Maybe say, “Okay, we have three strains of terrorists that we need to try to stop before they kill: Skinheads, Christian anti-abortionists, and Muslim extremists.” Notice that we are allowing the groups themselves to narrow down who they are. And it needn’t be religious. But it can be religious. Would you agree that that makes sense so far? You really want to go with those groups? Christian anti-abortionists, for example. If by “narrowly address” you mean the Catholics, Southern Baptists and a very large number of other Christians in America, I guess we can work with that, although I’m not going to say that it makes “sense” to do anything about it, since the number of members in that group alone probably numbers greater than 100 million in the U.S. By Skinheads, do you mean people with shaved heads and tattoos, or more specifically people who look like that AND are in known neo-nazi/white-nationalist organizations? While you’re at it, can you define “Muslim extremists” for me? Is that the Muslim equivalent of fundamentalists, or is it a Muslim with bombs strapped around his chest? So, based on the little information you’ve given me so far, I’m not seeing much “narrowing down” going on. Define it more tightly and I might go along for fun. ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/249 "2010-07-23T07:31:34Z")
A “muslim extremist” is someone who wants to cause me bodily harm because I don’t believe in their version of reality. They don’t have to be born in shitholes where the vast majority of inhabitants have no real conception of human rights and where everyone thinks subservience to Allah is the way forward, but that is usually a significant factor. Now, I could go around telling anyone dressing in a muslim stylee that Allah is a cunt and seeing which ones react violently, but I’m sure there must be a better, less antagonistic to non-violent muslims way of doing things, although this idea would be an effective way of determining violent muslims, and we could work from there to determine the more terroristic members of the community. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953/250 "2010-07-23T15:09:43Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Depends on the numbers. Vegetarians are a small percentage of the population and they are disproportionately represented among genocidal maniacs (well not in Cambodia but Pol Pot wasn’t a Buddhist). > [@](#): > > Nope. It’s common sense. If you’re looking for rabid pit bulls, looking for pit bulls is a pretty good start. If you are trying to isolate rabies, not merely pit bulls with rabies. Why round up all the pit bulls and check them for foaming at the mouth. Why not jsut round uip all the dogs (and SDMB posters) that foam at the mouth. > [@](#): > > I think that’s fine, too. I’d look at it both ways. It’s my guess that there is a greater likeliood that a Muslim radical could fly under the radar as a “radical”, so I’d start with “Muslim”. But even if you start with “Radical”, isn’t “Muslim” the next sieve? I hope so, because otherwise you’re wasting a lot of time looking at people that, by definition, you know are not Muslim radicals. But for some strange reason you are INTENT on ignoring Muslimness as a qualifying factor. That’s just dumb when the people you are looking for are 1) Muslim, of the 2) radical strain. But my point is that we are not trying to find muslim radicals, we are trying to find domestic terrorists. If we sieve for radicals we are going to get a bunch of muslim radicals, militia whackos, vegetarians, pro-life psychos and a host of other fucknuts. At that point why, I don’t see the musli radicals as any more worthy of attnetion than the other fucknuts. > [@](#): > > Well, this is just insane, and shows where your priorities are. You have a crime that you know to be committed by a black person, yet you would waste time and resources looking at skinheads and white supremacists? Please tell me you made a mistake. Because that is just plain counterproductive. Not to mention just plain dumb. Yeah this was a mistake. I forgot that the hypo assumed that the suspects were black. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-third-jihad-recommended-viewing/546953.md?page=12)