Todjaeger
Potstirrer
From an emergency response module that I teach answers the question of "What is Terrorism?" as;
With that fact in mind, it would be much better IMO if those individuals and groups who are willing to achieve their political/social objectives through the use of force/violence, could be identified before they become able to use force/violence. Unfortunately that goal, aside from just being hard to accomplish, lends itself to both a potential level of intrusion into the lives of ordinary people which might be considered as infringement upon a free society, as well as possible abuses by those in power against those they oppose politically or socially that has nothing to do with securing a nation.
One possible area would be for nations to become better at monitoring cyberspace, including some of the darker corners. It has been observed in some cases that there have been communications and interactions/exchanges between individuals and groups with various extremist views without the participants needing to travel or actually meet in person. This in turn is believed to sometimes reinforce the extremist views being held, as the participants start to view themselves as belonging to a larger group of like-minded people.
What would be interesting to see is if NZ security agencies have the ability to monitor Kiwi internet traffic between websites/IP addresses associated with certain specific known websites and internet users in NZ. If not, or if the latent ability is there but not the authority to use it, then creating the ability and authority might be a way to keep some of the people/groups with extremist views more isolated and possibly less prone to act.
While the above is not a legal definition, it does provide a fairly decent framework for people to consider what could be an act of terrorism, as well as why. It is also why I am uncomfortable with what seems like a rush towards gun control as a solution. If a person or group is willing to use force/violence to further a political or social objective, at best gun control would eliminate firearms as a tool to use force/violence. For what I hope are understandable reasons I do not wish to get into what some of the readily available alternative tools/weapons available to potential terrorists are, apart from various suitable materials being common enough that someone with the proper knowledge could likely go into any home and find what they need. Yes, some of the materials are that common, and keeping track of all of them is impossible from a practical standpoint.
With that fact in mind, it would be much better IMO if those individuals and groups who are willing to achieve their political/social objectives through the use of force/violence, could be identified before they become able to use force/violence. Unfortunately that goal, aside from just being hard to accomplish, lends itself to both a potential level of intrusion into the lives of ordinary people which might be considered as infringement upon a free society, as well as possible abuses by those in power against those they oppose politically or socially that has nothing to do with securing a nation.
One possible area would be for nations to become better at monitoring cyberspace, including some of the darker corners. It has been observed in some cases that there have been communications and interactions/exchanges between individuals and groups with various extremist views without the participants needing to travel or actually meet in person. This in turn is believed to sometimes reinforce the extremist views being held, as the participants start to view themselves as belonging to a larger group of like-minded people.
What would be interesting to see is if NZ security agencies have the ability to monitor Kiwi internet traffic between websites/IP addresses associated with certain specific known websites and internet users in NZ. If not, or if the latent ability is there but not the authority to use it, then creating the ability and authority might be a way to keep some of the people/groups with extremist views more isolated and possibly less prone to act.
