In the night from Sunday to Monday in Las Vegas happened a terrible, irreparable tragedy: during a music festival named Stephen Paddock from the window of the hotel opened fire on the people. As a result of the tragedy killed 58 people, more than 500 were injured.
And again, in society, the question arose: whether such an act committed by a person who, according to the FBI, has known ties to Muslim extremism, to call terrorism?
It should be noted that law enforcement agencies do not consider the tragedy as a terrorist attack. The Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo. «We believe that it was a local a lone gunman. He lives here…. At the moment we know his belief system,» said Sheriff Clark County Joe Lombardo.
Press Secretary of the White house Sarah Huckabee Sanders also said at a briefing Monday that «it would be premature to say» whether the shooting «an act of domestic terrorism».
However, in humans, the question arises: how shooting, which killed people, could not be an act of terrorism?
And yet, the majority of legislators, except for a few people (for example, a member of the house of representatives Tom Perez, Jim Cooper, Senator James Lankford), chose not to use the word «t». Perhaps it is because they don’t want to get ahead of it.
Washingron Post notes that the debate about how to call such attacks can seem empty with a discussion of the meaning of the word. People died, many were injured — and the word won’t change that. But how to call this incident, depends on as will be the case as the Federal government, and in the context of a national debate. And it’s important.
Now we’re obsessing over whether the NV carnage was «terrorism». If we decide it is, we’ll mobilize untold resources. If not, nothing.
— Jim Himes (@jahimes) October 2, 2017
«Now we are all arguing about whether to call the slaughter in Nevada»terrorism». If we decide that this is a terrorist attack, we
we have to mobilise all our backup resources. If not, then nothing will».
As for the technical definition of the term «terrorism», it is much more important to take into account the motives rather than the consequences and the number of victims of the attacks. Under Federal law,
terrorism is «the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, civilian population or any segment to achieve political or social goals.»
In other words, whether one person died or 50. The intentions of the attacker.
For example, Muslim extremism is a clear case of a clash of civilizations. It affects not only one country but the whole world. Its purpose is to intimidate.
Attacks such as those that were in Charleston, Charlottesville and Las Vegas, not so easily fit into a large-scale conflict, and the motives of the attackers (especially if they’re dead) to find out difficult.
The issue of characterization of such cases, of course, complicated. But in the case of, for example, attacks by Muslim radical groups, they are defined as terrorist attacks almost instantly. In cases like the shooting in Las Vegas, the exception version of terrorism is equal to the exception that is international or Islamic terrorism. Example: Lombardo, answering a question, said that the man was a local «He lives here.» But in fact it doesn’t matter.
What happened in Las Vegas meets at least one definition of terrorism: the definition in the state of Nevada. Nevada defines an act of terrorism as «any action that involves the use or attempted use of sabotage, coercion or violence, which aims to… of causing significant bodily harm or death to the population.»
This definition fully describes the shooting in Las Vegas, however, it is used very rarely. Why it happens is another matter for discussion.
