Was Nelson Mandela a Terrorist?

How do true freedom fighters react to their children being fired upon by police during peaceful protests about what language the children will be taught in. What is the appropriate response for civilians when a nation's army is turned on them.To call the violence the ANC practiced terrorism is to dignify terrorism to the point where the term is meaningless as a label. I think you've made some great points, but I'd go further. Many Americans are lying hypocrites. Violence, even directed at civilians, has been and still is routinely accepted by most Americans as justified.I don't honestly know what, if any violence is fairly attributed to or was endorsed by Nelson Mandela. But it would have to be pretty horrible if it dwarfed the bad karma generated from nuking entire cities or even some of our drone strikes. I highly doubt that Mandela has that kind of blood on his hands.

What yenmor says he would have done is indeed vile. But I think we should apply the term 'criminal' to people who do vile stuff, and not use it for people who talk smack about what they would do if they found themselves in situations that are unlikely to be realized.And let's be glad Mandela himself avoided taking that dark path. Had he not, most likely many of his countrymen and their children would be dead now.

I don't believe I did. Really? Because I don't think most Americans have faced anything like the kind of oppression the apartheid regime routinely applied. What was our ancestors answer?We might also ask our ancestors how to best respond to Native American attacks or to being fired upon by colored troops in an opposing army. I expect that the answers would be self serving and reprehensible to many of us, and yet others of us would readily understand and forgive those responses. Is 'the lesser of evils' really the way to judge? If that is the standard, then how can the question of whether Mandela was a terrorist be the least bit important? Why not just pick a side of the conflict and judge whether the results actions helped your side. Because only when the most important thing is who died, and not that humans died can 'the lesser of evils' be used to justify nuking two cities.For this discussion, it is not necessary to decide on which was the lesser of two evils. If that choice is giving you difficulty, you are likely a decent human being. And a decent human being should at least accept that Mandela might have faced equally difficult choices.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

This statement, coming from a man who believes the Wilmington Massacre was pure 'democracy in action', is pretty close to laughable.Since yenmor is a criminal why don't you tell us what would be appropriate punishment for his thought crimes.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

I did not intend to question you about this. I don't see any problem with asking what Mandela did or did not do. You are not the villain here. Perhaps that is a debate for another time. For this discussion, it would be a deep rabbit hole.

Actually, that is exactly what the term was intended to mean. You can extend it beyond that yes. But to extend it to people who are simply discussing things they might do in hypothetical situations, is ridiculous. We do have other words that work quite well to describe people who don't think like you do. Not getting what you want doesn't justify violence. And Yenmor described a response to a lot more provocation than was involved in the Willmington Massacre. Perhaps you are the 'criminal'.

The accusation of criminality was a bit silly yes.But let's recall that you said you would go "the civil war route". On its face, that too was a silly thing to say. You have in fact, since then, backed off from actually meaning what you said. At least that is how I read your response to Son Goku.But you did in fact say way what you said, and people responded to it. Why should they not have done so?

Then stop whining about being called on it. Except that you did type just the opposite sentiment into your tablet. From now on when you say goofy stuff I'll just blame it on your tablet. Your tablet does not know any history. I'm going to assume that is because it is only a couple of years old and not because it is an idiot.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Your tablet is an idiot. No one is shrinking your position down to a single sentence. People are objecting to the sentiment expressed in a sentence that your tablet posted and for which you take no responsibility whatsoever.