I want to weigh in on the discussion of whether the Charleston, S.C., massacre was an act of terrorism.
Here goes: I believe it qualifies.
Dylann Roof is accused of murdering nine people after he spent an hour studying the Bible with them. He reached into a pocket, or something, pulled out a gun and started shooting.
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/the-killings-in-charleston-werent-terrorism-119233.html?hp=m1#.VYY_CVLbKt8
The victims never saw it coming. An act of terror? By my definition of the word, yes.
Yet we’re not calling it that. It’s a “hate crime.” Muslims who opened fire in Texas before they were killed were “terrorists.” A young white man in Charleston does the same thing and he’s called a “racist,” a “lunatic,” or a “mass murderer.”
You want mass murder? The 9/11 attacks certainly qualify. They, too, were carried out by terrorists.
I am growing weary of these word games.
The Charleston shooter was a terrorist, who committed a hate crime, who killed many people at once and thus, qualifies as a mass murderer.
Why not lump all these descriptions together?
We can stop playing semantic games with the language.