TERRORISM - Can it be eliminated? If so, how? What is your plan?

In order to answer the question, I first need to define what terrorism is according to me. It is an act of violence intended to both inflict fear in a group of people and get a specific message heard. That being the case, the Boston Tea Party was just as much an act of terrorism as 9/11 was--the most important difference being the loss of innocent lives on 9/11.

What do we then do to stop terrorism from happening?

We stop the need for it. Terrorists don't use terrorism as a first response. At no point in time did someone read the newspaper, get mad about an issue he/she just learned about for the first time, and decide to nuke a city in response. Terrorism is a last resort, something people do when they can find no other way to be heard. Terrorism comes out of anguish, turmoil, and devestation.

To stop terrorism, then, ...

--We need to teach parents like those of the students who did the Columbine shootings to look for the signs of disturbed teens and to get them help.

--We need to acknowledge that the Israel/Palestine situation is horrible and that talking isn't enough. Reparations need to be made, counselling needs to be inacted, healing needs to be nurtured, and education about cultural differences and acceptance needs to happen.

--We need to wean our children away from the selfish, immediate-gratification, anti-social worlds of television and video games. We now have several generations of people who barely know how to communicate because communication has become unnecessary when all we need to do is push buttons to exist. Every person who is living such a life is a person who is not helping in terrorism, war, injustice, and strife.

--We need to stop pretending the American way is the only way and acknowledge that we're just as big of f-ups as the rest of the world. We're full of gluttony and greed, egocentricism and Nihilism, yet Americans are affronted when people in other countries act the same way.

--We need to learn to listen to people. Truly listen. We need to know why the IRA continues to fight and why the Una Bomber, well, bombed. We need to listen not to prove them wrong, but to find solutions for the problem and for their pain. We need to listen in order to know how to listen to the next person before he/she becomes a terrorist.

--We need to start within ourselves. How many people's ideas have you felt like annihilating today? None? Really? Don't you want cannibalism to end? Racism? Genocide? Remember, the people who commit acts of terrorism have an injustice that they want to end, too. I'm not saying terrorism is ever right, but I am saying that we need to understand it before we can, well, annihilate it.

Kim Edwards