attacks on Christians' on Easter Sunday in Sri Lanka

[H4run]

The reason why the thread about New Zealand attack involved more discussion than this one is really obvious, it is because on that event there are much to discuss, while here the stance already pretty much established in the sense that Muslim terrorism already fought in a global scale, heck they even invade two nation because of that (Iraq and Afghanistan) and just recently they passed a law where one click on terrorist propaganda can put anyone in jail for 15 years if they don't have enough believable reason to click that. People pretty much agreed about how bad that is.

However in contrary the New Zealand attack attracts mixed reaction, from a condemnation until an excuse for the culprit. And while the ultra-right movement and its called for violence becoming more and more popular there is not enough effort to see the atrocities as a product of something organized and systematic, and there is not enough knowledge and action to treat it as such-as it always treated as a separated individual, or an act of a mad man as opposed to an act of a conscious ideological driven group. While the propagandist, the agitator and the callers of action are pretty much save doing what they are doing in the name of freedom of expression and freedom of speech. Hence there are more controversies to attracts more discussion and pros and cons.

 

[Ajidica]

Not much interest in this one as was to be expected, Christchurch thread on here 37 pages consisting of 724 posts.

I guess there's only so much signaling of the virtue you can do when attacks like this happen.

I would say it is more a case of much more information being available about the Christchurch terrorist attack. We knew who the murderer was, what his ideology was, and what he hoped to accomplish. The Sri Lankan government only began putting out information today. Further, the available information raises more questions than it answers -how a small and disorganized group known for vandalizing Buddhist statues ended up targeting a religious minority in a highly coordinated plot that murdered over 300 people and wounded over 500.

 

[H4run]

I would say it is more a case of much more information being available about the Christchurch terrorist attack. We knew who the murderer was, what his ideology was, and what he hoped to accomplish. The Sri Lankan government only began putting out information today. Further, the available information raises more questions than it answers -how a small and disorganized group known for vandalizing Buddhist statues ended up targeting a religious minority in a highly coordinated plot that murdered over 300 people and wounded over 500.

Lets say it is already clear that the ISIS did that, there is already a consensus opinion and global condemnation about that, except if there is some politician who suddenly making an excuse or some poster who suddenly chose to rationalized such action, people pretty much on the pro side, there is no pros and cons regarding this hence It doesn't attracts further discussion.

 

[Hrothbern]

It looks like the info about the attack was already known in January
Long before the Christchurch attack.
(New York Times)

It looks like that the President of Sri Lanka was informed on the attack, but the PM was not informed.

Reuters comes in March last year with the story that the President at that time supported the riots by Buddhist groups against Muslims.


I think it would be wise not to look at this attack now with the blinkers on of our western countries, not jump to conclusions.

 

[abradley]

It looks like the info about the attack was already known in January
Long before the Christchurch attack.
(New York Times)

It looks like that the President of Sri Lanka was informed on the attack, but the PM was not informed.

Reuters comes in March last year with the story that the President at that time supported the riots by Buddhist groups against Muslims.


I think it would be wise not to look at this attack now with the blinkers on of our western countries, not jump to conclusions.

So the attack was ok because an ex President was ok with anti Muslim riots?

Was that President Catholic?

Why shouldn't we use Western Culture Blinkers, the assassins were using Islamic blinkers?

 

[Hrothbern]

Why shouldn't we use Western Culture Blinkers, the assassins were using Islamic blinkers?

My post gave some infos that help understanding the picture.

If you have blinkers on, from whatever nature, while in the process of understanding something, you easily overlook something relevant to form a well-informed opinion.



I gave three bits of info in my post:
A. the attacks were according to the NYT planned in January, which is well before the Christchurch attack against Muslims.
* According to that NYT article: the Sri Lankan Security Services swooped down on within hours at least 24 suspects. This suggests that more info was known in advance than just a hunch.
* Also according to that NYT article: the SLSS had a detailed scenario book of the planned attacks summarised in a memo.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/22/world/asia/ntj-warning-sri-lanka-government.amp.html

=> it was not planned as a Muslim reprisal on Christians for Christchurch.
(But many western people jumped from Cristchurch to that "obvious" conclusion)

B. It looks like that the President of Sri Lanka was informed on the attack, but the PM was not informed.
There is for many years a continuous power struggle in the elite. The current President was elected in 2015, and appointed in oct 2018 Rajapaksa as PM and fired the sitting elelected PM Wickremesinghe. After a constitutional crisis the current President was forced to re-instate Wickremesinghe. In the background is a power struggle of influence between India and China. China wanting control over Sri Lanka as naval base in the Indian Ocean and as strong-point for its Belt and Road project. China in favor of Rajapaksa !!! IDK whether the PM is catholic. The not-informed PM Wickremesinghe has however almost the same family name as his wife Maitree Wickremasinghe, which is again almost the same family name as a Sri Lankan bishop Wickramasinghe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_Diocese_of_Galle

Was that President Catholic?

The President is a Buddhist. His preferred PM Rajapaksa a Buddhist with a personal talisman cult and in his past alligned to radical Buddhist groups.
The geopolitical significance of the China-India struggle... the general unstable, volatile and violent background of Sri Lanka, with tribal civil wars, with mob riots.... the political rivalry.... Muslims and Christians both minorities without much influence....
Why did that President not inform his PM ???

=> can all this background be ignored when trying to understand the picture ? Is it so that western newsmedia looking for some fast bullet point text to add to gruelsome pictures, are going to write a big background article ?
(but hey.... let's ignore that all, all those details of a far away former colony with brown people messing up... and jump to the "obvious" conclusions)


C. Reuters comes in March last year with the story that the President at that time supported the riots by Buddhist groups against Muslims.
https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN1H102Q
so... why for example not consider the possibility that the attacks of this weekend were a retaliation on the President for the Buddhist attacks of March 2018, which are understood by the Muslim community to have been supported (or worse) by the President and his preferred PM Rajapaksa ???


=> There are many possible motives to consider in this case !


Let's add some possible scenarios:
First another info:
That security info came from the India government.
And do mind in the background is the India-China influence conflict on Sri Lanka.
For example as another scenario: the President and his preferred PM Rajapaksa "helped" those riots in March 2018 to get enough unrest to get Rajapaska in power (Rajapaska was the strongman that crushed with a lot of violence the bloody terrorism and civil war of the Tamils. In november 2018 the putch was tried, but failed.
The President "knew" about some radical Muslims wanting revenge and did nothing because he wants those terrorist attacks to happen and use the general unrest to weaken the position of the PM, to replace him.
China happy that this offers again the chance that their favorite, Rajapaksa comes in power again... and at least that Wickremesinghe, their archenemy, is getting weakened.


so... why not that very "convenient" set of terrorist attacks including some on churches on Eastern, including some on expensive hotels with western tourists to get better international newsmedia coverage.
And yeah.. whether involved or not... ISIS will be happy to say it is with their blessing. Everybody in echo chambers happy.
Big events can be seen, and be used, in many ways.

And back to my main opinion so far on this horror event:

Don't jump to the conclusions.
Don't confuse individuals used as usefull fools with a structural cause of a community.
We just don't know enough !

And my conclusion in my first post on this:

I do not think that lightly suggesting up to profiling in the western newsmedia that this is an attack on Christendom will be very helpfull in solving the Sri Lanka issues, and future violence.

What Sri Lanka needs, being in a difficult situation, is more tolerance for all minorities and a better government (a better President and general political-governmental culture).

 

[abradley]

My post gave some infos that help understanding the picture.

If you have blinkers on, from whatever nature, while in the process of understanding something, you easily overlook something relevant to form a well-informed opinion.



I gave three bits of info in my post:
A. the attacks were according to the NYT planned in January, which is well before the Christchurch attack against Muslims.
* According to that NYT article: the Sri Lankan Security Services swooped down on within hours at least 24 suspects. This suggests that more info was known in advance than just a hunch.
* Also according to that NYT article: the SLSS had a detailed scenario book of the planned attacks summarised in a memo.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/22/world/asia/ntj-warning-sri-lanka-government.amp.html

=> it was not planned as a Muslim reprisal on Christians for Christchurch.
(But many western people jumped from Cristchurch to that "obvious" conclusion)

B. It looks like that the President of Sri Lanka was informed on the attack, but the PM was not informed.
There is for many years a continuous power struggle in the elite. The current President was elected in 2015, and appointed in oct 2018 Rajapaksa as PM and fired the sitting elelected PM Wickremesinghe. After a constitutional crisis the current President was forced to re-instate Wickremesinghe. In the background is a power struggle of influence between India and China. China wanting control over Sri Lanka as naval base in the Indian Ocean and as strong-point for its Belt and Road project. China in favor of Rajapaksa !!! IDK whether the PM is catholic. The not-informed PM Wickremesinghe has however almost the same family name as his wife Maitree Wickremasinghe, which is again almost the same family name as a Sri Lankan bishop Wickramasinghe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_Diocese_of_Galle

The President is a Buddhist. His preferred PM Rajapaksa a Buddhist with a personal talisman cult and in his past alligned to radical Buddhist groups.
The geopolitical significance of the China-India struggle... the general unstable, volatile and violent background of Sri Lanka, with tribal civil wars, with mob riots.... the political rivalry.... Muslims and Christians both minorities without much influence....
Why did that President not inform his PM ???

=> can all this background be ignored when trying to understand the picture ? Is it so that western newsmedia looking for some fast bullet point text to add to gruelsome pictures, are going to write a big background article ?
(but hey.... let's ignore that all, all those details of a far away former colony with brown people messing up... and jump to the "obvious" conclusions)


C. Reuters comes in March last year with the story that the President at that time supported the riots by Buddhist groups against Muslims.
https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN1H102Q
so... why for example not consider the possibility that the attacks of this weekend were a retaliation on the President for the Buddhist attacks of March 2018, which are understood by the Muslim community to have been supported (or worse) by the President and his preferred PM Rajapaksa ???


=> There are many possible motives to consider in this case !


Let's add some possible scenarios:
First another info:
That security info came from the India government.
And do mind in the background is the India-China influence conflict on Sri Lanka.
For example as another scenario: the President and his preferred PM Rajapaksa "helped" those riots in March 2018 to get enough unrest to get Rajapaska in power (Rajapaska was the strongman that crushed with a lot of violence the bloody terrorism and civil war of the Tamils. In november 2018 the putch was tried, but failed.
The President "knew" about some radical Muslims wanting revenge and did nothing because he wants those terrorist attacks to happen and use the general unrest to weaken the position of the PM, to replace him.
China happy that this offers again the chance that their favorite, Rajapaksa comes in power again... and at least that Wickremesinghe, their archenemy, is getting weakened.


so... why not that very "convenient" set of terrorist attacks including some on churches on Eastern, including some on expensive hotels with western tourists to get better international newsmedia coverage.
And yeah.. whether involved or not... ISIS will be happy to say it is with their blessing. Everybody in echo chambers happy.
Big events can be seen, and be used, in many ways.

And back to my main opinion so far on this horror event:

Don't jump to the conclusions.
Don't confuse individuals used as usefull fools with a structural cause of a community.
We just don't know enough !

And my conclusion in my first post on this:

What Sri Lanka needs, being in a difficult situation, is more tolerance for all minorities and a better government (a better President and general political-governmental culture).

Interesting, but I see nothing that justifies them attacking innocent civilians, do you?

 

[Hrothbern]

Interesting, but I see nothing that justifies them attacking innocent civilians, do you?

I was talking about blinkers
And you reacted on that with:

Why shouldn't we use Western Culture Blinkers, the assassins were using Islamic blinkers?

By that you give yourself the right to have Western Culture blinkers, based on your unproven assumption that the assassins were using Islamic blinkers.
Us<->them.

Now you evade to the general comment that attacking innocent civilians is not justified.
I did nowhere say that this attack was justified.

So.. to the point of the blinkers

Do you agree that it is wrong to jump to conclusions, to opinions, before you know "good enough" what the total picture is ?

 

[abradley]

I was talking about blinkers
And you reacted on that with:


By that you give yourself the right to have Western Culture blinkers, based on your unproven assumption that the assassins were using Islamic blinkers.
Us<->them.

Now you evade to the general comment that attacking innocent civilians is not justified.
I did nowhere say that this attack was justified.

So.. to the point of the blinkers

Do you agree that it is wrong to jump to conclusions, to opinions, before you know "good enough" what the total picture is ?

What blinkers do you suppose the Islamists were using?

 

[Hrothbern]

What blinkers do you suppose the Islamists were using?

That is a question I can pose to the people involved in those actions.
And not being in the location or position to ask that... nor having more info.... I can only speculate

But with you.... here and now... that is easy... I can simply ask you that question

So.. to the point of the blinkers

Do you agree that it is wrong to jump to conclusions, to opinions, before you know "good enough" what the total picture is ?

?

 

[Modder_Mode]

It's true that the majority of the forum members belong to the Western cultural sphere, so it's rather natural, though depressing, that we care more about something happening in New Zealand than in Sri Lanka.

Though I'd wager there's also another important point here:

Christchurch was more «familiar» and controversial because it directly involved the use of social media, touched on gun control, and even that some people find it harder to condemn white «nativist» terrorists. Controversy leads to lots to talk about.

In this case everyone agrees that the terrorists responsible for this are awful, so there's not much to talk about.

Furthermore, the Sri Lankan government seems to be handling it, have made arrests, and claims to know who's responsible. We could sit here and speculate on the same, but most of us has nothing to go on, except assuming that it's radicalized Muslims, and talking about what little we know of internal Sri Lankan politics. Which some posters already have attempted.

I would say it is more a case of much more information being available about the Christchurch terrorist attack. We knew who the murderer was, what his ideology was, and what he hoped to accomplish. The Sri Lankan government only began putting out information today. Further, the available information raises more questions than it answers -how a small and disorganized group known for vandalizing Buddhist statues ended up targeting a religious minority in a highly coordinated plot that murdered over 300 people and wounded over 500.

I agree with pretty much 95% of what you both said, but it goes much deeper than this, ask yourself why is the condemnation of this attack different; its worded different, the level of financial support is different, the level of outrage is different. This is not a loaded question, it honestly isn't, but does anyone get the feeling that a lot of people have been brainwashed (or programmed for a less extreme word) to react differently and exhibit different levels of outrage to different groups of people when attacks happen? For example some people feel that the Israelis get away with murder in the West Bank, Gaza etc. (this is not my stance btw) because of the history of what happened to Jews and the Holocaust, a level of victim hood which still extends to this day?

I have a feeling that a lot of this brainwashing/programming is to try and normalize the various extremities of Islam and try and make it more acceptable to Western culture and lifestyles.

 

[Modder_Mode]

The phrase "virtue signalling" implies an accurate and unerring knowledge of the true intentions, motives, and feelings of everyone it's used toward. Since the number of long-range telepaths and telegnostics to make this a realistic, plausible concept obviously don't exist (or many other, much more profound and drastic social changes would also be very evident), I can only conclude that the term "virtue signalling" is no more than a bunk, empty, incendiary, vitriolic term of flailing, blind social attacks, rhetorical desperation, and pure nonsense.

But to be virtuous is a very important human trait, prompting a dopamine hit from the brain, you get that good feeling about you when you've done something that you feel is good, unfortunately with virtue signalers they don't do anything productive, they are actually counter productive, they're happy to post a rant on Facebook about climate change, poverty or inequality all the whilst traveling to the four corners of the world pumping out who knows how much C02, enjoying 6 glorious meals a day and happily buying clothes made in a sweatshop from a third world country whose workers are payed $1 a day, you see they don't want to change THEIR lifestyle, they want to lecture and judge everyone else to change their lifestyle, then maybe they might decide to cut back to 2 cafe lattes a day rather than 5. These posts are normally followed be several likes and positive comments from friends hence the dopamine hit, they still get that dopamine rush for doing nothing because no one really want's to call them out on it...

 

[abradley]

That is a question I can pose to the people involved in those actions.
And not being in the location or position to ask that... nor having more info.... I can only speculate

But with you.... here and now... that is easy... I can simply ask you that question



?

What question?

 

[Hrothbern]

What question?

this question:
"Do you agree that it is wrong to jump to conclusions, to opinions, before you know "good enough" what the total picture is ?"

So.. to the point of the blinkers

Do you agree that it is wrong to jump to conclusions, to opinions, before you know "good enough" what the total picture is ?

 

[Cheetah]

I agree with pretty much 95% of what you both said, but it goes much deeper than this, ask yourself why is the condemnation of this attack different; its worded different, the level of financial support is different, the level of outrage is different. This is not a loaded question, it honestly isn't, but does anyone get the feeling that a lot of people have been brainwashed (or programmed for a less extreme word) to react differently and exhibit different levels of outrage to different groups of people when attacks happen? For example some people feel that the Israelis get away with murder in the West Bank, Gaza etc. (this is not my stance btw) because of the history of what happened to Jews and the Holocaust, a level of victim hood which still extends to this day?

I have a feeling that a lot of this brainwashing/programming is to try and normalize the various extremities of Islam and try and make it more acceptable to Western culture and lifestyles.

Certain people are trying to blame an accident in Notre Dame on Muslims, and you're suggesting that we as a society have been brainwashed to tolerate Islamic-inspired terrorist attacks?? Your «non-loaded question» is suggesting the existence of a conspiracy to weaken «native» Western populations against the onslaught of Islam?!

The two situations are different because of what I wrote: Most Western people think people in New Zealand as in a closer in-group than people in Sri Lanka, and the attack in New Zealand was committed by someone most of us would have considered in our in-group.

 

[Farm Boy]

We are Easter people.

 

[Modder_Mode]

Certain people are trying to blame an accident in Notre Dame on Muslims

Absolutely it goes both ways, when a terrorist attack occurs, which particular religion is usually the first to be named even before any evidence becomes available? Why is this? Is this a normal human reaction? A social construct? Conditioning? Ignorance? Bigotry? What do you think when you first see a headline of yet another terrorist attack somewhere in the world, do you get a brief thought of whom might be responsible?

and you're suggesting that we as a society have been brainwashed to tolerate Islamic-inspired terrorist attacks??

That is the question I'm asking, yes. What are your thoughts? Do you think certain social media posts by political leaders, the media and the masses in general when Islam is involved are handled very differently and indeed carefully when compared to other groups? When was the last time the secular West had blasphemy laws? How far away are we from citizens that live in the West that criticize Islam being charged and thrown in Jail?

Your «non-loaded question» is suggesting the existence of a conspiracy to weaken «native» Western populations against the onslaught of Islam?!

Not so much a conspiracy but media and political rhetoric that somehow Islam really isn't as bad as people think and that it is actually compatible with Western culture and values.

The two situations are different because of what I wrote: Most Western people think people in New Zealand as in a closer in-group than people in Sri Lanka, and the attack in New Zealand was committed by someone most of us would have considered in our in-group.

I agree with this. Humans still do exhibit signs of tribal identity, no doubt, but this still doesn't answer the question as to why politicians, the media and the masses in general portray these equally evil and despicable terrorists attacks differently, every attack in Western countries before Christchurch was handled very differently. Maybe you don't agree with this premise and that's fair enough.

 

[Modder_Mode]

We are Easter people.

Not according to Mr Obama and Mrs Clinton, it's "Easter Worshipers", not Christians, the victims weren't Christians, they were Easter Worshipers.

 

[Farm Boy]

That's worse. Christians at Easter services are in their house of worship. In a place, theoretically, of peace. About as well as we ever do, at any rate.

Christians die in wars, they die in murders, they die at hotels, at concerts. There is something especially base about intentionally murdering people in worship. True at Christschurch, true in Charleston, true in Sri Lanka.

 

[Cheetah]

That is the question I'm asking, yes. What are your thoughts?

I think you could get a job at Fox News, Breitbart, or one of the British tabloids. There's also some Norwegian ones you could look at, if you knew the language.

I think that reactions to vile actions committed by members of an out-group needs to be handled differently than if the actions were committed by members of an in-group.

I know that many Western countries still have blasphemy laws. I know Monty Python's Life of Brian was banned in Norway because it was blasphemous against Christianity!

I know that it is fully possible to criticize Islam, and that, e.g., neither Sam Harris nor Richard Dawkins have ever had any trouble with the law because of their public and constant criticism of it.

I think there was preciously little difference between how media and people talked about the terror attacks in New Zealand, in Norway, in France, or now, in Sri Lanka, except for the whole in-group/out-group thing where Sri Lanka feels further away.

I think your «questioning» is insincere, loaded, and «dog whistling», and I find it deeply problematic.