Comment by nickpsecurity | Hacker News Reader

Comment by nickpsecurity | Hacker News Reader

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Great writeup. On top of it, the terror attacks are extremely rare because most people have no interest committing mass-murder and the few that do rarely have motive/opportunity. So, refusing to be terrorized remains the best bet.

Far as intelligence agencies, they've not just failed: they've often tried to cover it up, mislead other authorities, or even destroy evidence. The result of incompetent organizations not capitalizing on what they have even when it's obvious should be a net reduction of power and increase of accountability. Instead, they always ask for and often get the opposite.

The technically literate of us following the details should just keep reiterating to anyone that will listen the key detail: almost everyone whose launched an attack did it while already being under surveillance. It doesn't work. End of story.

Note: If it did, they just go back to doing what pro's already are in using human go-betweens and other low-to-no-tech methods like Osama did for years to dodge NSA. They didn't get him until someone tipped them off for the bounty per Hersh.

How do you convince someone to refuse to be terrorized though? If I know someone who feels genuine fear when they hear about these sorts of attacks, what do I say to them? "You're an idiot", "here is some math", and "you're giving them power over you" are not effective approaches.

How do I convince someone they should try to not feel fear if they strongly believe their fear is valid and that attempts to invalidate their fear are an insult.

I think "here is some math" is a good way, but you need to be really delicate about it and take it slowly. What you're fighting is an emotional reaction that's hard-wired into our brains. The problem stems from them having an invalid view of the world, i.e. perceiving terror attacks as vastly more probable than they really are. Therefore you need to fix their worldview - or rather, help them fix it themselves. Showing the attacks in perspective is one way to do that, and the one that - over time - helped me stop worrying, even though after 9/11 I was scared the world is ending and that I'll die in a mall attack tomorrow. It takes time, and you can't push it too hard - if you become their conversational enemy, you've not just lost, you'll strenghten their fears.

The problem with those "maths" is they are no longer in favor of not being "terrorized" in some places.

The math is still in favour in the United States and in the European Union. Unless the friend lives somewhere in the Middle East, I don't see a problem with that argument.

You could try telling them that police kill more people than terrorist do https://reason.com/blog/2014/12/09/more-than-1000-people-hav...

Do NOT do that. You're just putting them against you in debate.

What about people who think it's simply unjust when innocent people are killed in the name of some religious/political end? E.g. I know that there is almost no chance that I'll be the victim of gang violence. But that doesn't mean I have to just accept the existence of gang violence in my community.

> What about people who think it's simply unjust when innocent people are killed in the name of some religious/political end?

I don't think that you'll find many exceptions to that.

> E.g. I know that there is almost no chance that I'll be the victim of gang violence. But that doesn't mean I have to just accept the existence of gang violence in my community.

So, as a member of that community you then have the option to go out and do something about it. You can also move out, you can pay someone else to do something about it (which you already do through your taxes, hopefully they do enough). You can also keep your eyes open if you see anything suspicious and report it. You can rally support for better pay for the police so the chances of corrupt police interacting with gangs goes down.

And finally, it may actually mean that yes, you will have to accept the existence of gang violence in your community if that community is incapable of changing from within.

Gang violence takes a while to establish itself, and it - even with the best of the best working to get rid of it - can't be gotten rid overnight. Problems of this kind usually take roughly as long to fix as it takes to solve them.

I don't disagree that it's hard to eradicate. But I don't see anyone saying we should just refuse to be scared by gang violence and not try to do anything about it.

Probably because it has nothing to do with the topic or just doesn't fit it well. What would you do about gang violence if they all looked like innocent people with nothing discerning them and the attacks were so rare that your neighborhood got hit only once every 100-1,000 years? Would it even be worth worrying about vs all the things that have been killing people in your area regularly? Or would you just refuse to worry about it in general while dealing with it if it ever happens? (aka refuse to be terrorized)

Note: The 100-1,000 years is to represent the fact that virtually nobody dies from terrorist attacks. It's so rare that bathtubs and bee stings kill more people each year in the U.S.. I'd imagine it's not a leading cause of death in France either despite the recent attack. So, for your gang thing with 100-200 people in a neighborhood, they'd go through many generations before one person died from gang violence. Sounds like the high risk that should keep them up at night, eh? ;)

How do you convince someone that flying is the safest mode of transportation? Sometimes you just can't.

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