Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

> dishonest idea

stochastic terrorism appears to be the academic way of saying “inciting mob violence”

seems pretty straightfoward and honest, to me




> stochastic terrorism appears to be the academic way of saying “inciting mob violence”

Do you have an example where you think those two concepts could be used interchangeably in academia?

I weren't able to find one and I don't think those terms describe similar ideas. Mob dynamics might be about scale in some form, but they are usually not about what we would commonly refer to as terrorism.


The OP article refers to the following research:

“As described by leading scholars, stochas­tic terrorism involves ‘the use of mass media to provoke random acts of ideolog­i­cally motivated violence that are statistically predictable but individually unpre­dict­able’ (Hamm and Spaaij, 2017)”

maybe inciting “distributed mob violence” would be a better way to translate it for laymen.


If I go stab a bunch of people and say BLM inspired me to do it, does BLM become a stochastic terrorism organization? Is Jodie Foster a stochastic terrorist for seducing Hinckley Jr with her looks?

You can place blame anywhere depending on your agenda.


> If I go stab a bunch of people and say BLM inspired me to do it, does BLM become a stochastic terrorism organization?

That would depend on what evidence you can show to the court that convinces them that you were actually inspired by them.

The court of law operates with letters in the mail, not comments on a website.


Is the BDS movement an example of stochastic terrorism? Someone told me they exist to inspire hate crimes against Jewish and Israeli citizens.

Are hasbara organizations stochastic terrorist in nature? Someone told me they exist to distract from settler-colonial violence against Palestinians.

Who should get to decide which warrants investigation?


I’d have to refer you to places like Southern Poverty or law enforcement to identify specific sponsors of terror.

I believe that, in the United States, prosecutors, law enforcement officers, and congress are the ones who decide what warrants investigation, generally speaking.


If you think your law enforcement should decide which political speech is terrorism, you have many home countries to choose from -- from the U.K. to Saudi Arabia -- but the U.S. is not one of them. Best of luck!




Join us for AI Startup School this June 16-17 in San Francisco!

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: