Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Today's Quote

dear chidi,

sometimes definitions seem to rise above conflict, and evolve slowly as all words do. sometimes the words are created in the heat of the political moment. my sense is bush mobilized/instrumentalized the word terrorist after 9/11. in doing that, he, and his regime and followers, removed any debate over the issue of americans mobilizing or supporting attacks on muslims, and turned radical militant muslim protests into something outside political discourse. the same was true for the increasing use of the term for palestinians, suicide bombers (which incidentally began by the tamil tigers in sri lanka), andj others. if lbj had the word at hand in the 1960s, he would have used it for the viet cong or n vietnamese.

terrorists are now simply the enemies of the regime. notice how abiy is using it for tigrayan opposition in ethiopia, and as an excuse seems to be ethnically cleansing addis.

the most charged political word i can think of is nowadays terrorist. it is, like all words, created, used, deployed, and misused. its definition doesn't come from god, but from humans who seem to like using words as well as guns against those who oppose them.

if we use the term, it can't be naively as if we weren't taking a position. that's all i meant.

farooq could help out here....

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Chidi Anthony Opara, FIIM <chidi.opara@gmail.com>
Sent: Sunday, November 21, 2021 5:34 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Today's Quote

 

Ken(my culture does not permit this, but you permitted me)

If your position here is adopted, every tag, etc, negative or positive would be questioned. There would be no definition of anything.

-CAO.

On Sunday, November 21, 2021, Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu> wrote:

called bigotry by whom?

who is a terrorist, for instance?

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Chidi Anthony Opara, FIIM <chidi.opara@gmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, November 20, 2021 4:37 AM
To: USA African Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Today's Quote

 

Most people have proclivities that can righly be called bigotry.

-Chidi Anthony Opara (CAO)

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Chidi Anthony Opara is a Poet, IIM Professional Fellow, MIT Chief Data Officer Ambassador and Founder/Publisher of, www.publicinformationprojects.org)

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Chidi Anthony Opara is a Poet, IIM Professional Fellow, MIT Chief Data Officer Ambassador and Founder/Publisher of, www.publicinformationprojects.org)

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