Serious 150+ dead in Paris terrorist attack

[Texas Cloverleaf]

Reddit live stream of the attack here

Update - French media says at least 40 people are dead after a series of violent incidents in and around Paris

BREAKING Rt @BFMTV A gunman yelled 'it's for Syria' in french during the shooting in #Bataclan theatre #ParisAttacks

#Paris no claim of responsibility yet but Islamic State supporters are praising the attack on social media with 'Paris in flames' hashtag

UPDATE: At least 60 people are reported dead in #Paris, according to CNN affiliate BFM.

BREAKING: Another shooting reported in Paris, at Les Halles shopping mall: Europe 1 Radio. http://reut.rs/1Mcyebr

VIDEO: Firefight on the streets of Paris

NSFW VIDEO: A man wounded in the shootings

Hostages texting that hostages are being killed 1-by-1, begging police to raid #Paris - CNN via @AnneBayefsky

Speculation: retribution for the killing of Jihadi John?

Confirmed : about 100 deads inside the Bataclan

 

[Thetwinmasters]

https://www.reddit.com/live/vwwnkuplwr9y
http://live.reuters.com/Event/Paris_attacks_2

 

[Codraroll]

Speculation: retribution for the killing of Jihadi John?

Hardly anything that could have been coordinated in a span of so few hours. Retribution for France bombing Syria, maybe.

...not like it will cause any less bombings in Syria, though. For the sake of civilians in al-Raqqa, I just hope France shows enough restraint to not bring out the boomers.

 

[Aladyyn]

This is the start of something big. I don't know what, but something seriously needs to happen.

 

[SparksBlade]

i just hope that in the wake of "something needs to happen" they don't do anything stupid

prayers go out to everyone

 

[Thetwinmasters]

https://twitter.com/Limportant_fr/status/665325765894909952

"Islamic State claims attacks in Paris, warns London, Rome and Washington."

 

[Aladyyn]

140 dead according to the latest info. 100 in the Bataclan concert hall.

 

[Lord Outrage]

It's a really sad day here. Rest in peace to all the victims. One of my best friends got struck by a bullet in his calf, thanks God he is fine now.

I just would like to say that terrorism has no religion. Please pray for the victims tonight.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

This will end well...

French President Hollande: "We are going to lead a war which will be pitiless."

 

[ButteredToast]

Hearing this today and listening to the radio in shock, I can only really ask what's next. Where do we go from here, what can be done to punish the organizations of people who support this, and what can be done to end this. I have seen enough senseless violence and terrorism in my lifetime, and I have had enough. I am not sure what needs to be done, as intervention backfires and isolation is ineffective. But something needs to be done. I don't want to wait around and watch in a few months when another one of these damned things happens to innocents somewhere in the world.

Something needs to start clicking with people throughout the western world that we are at war. That just because we are fighting a war against an enemy without borders, citizens, or industry does not mean we are in a war. And yeah, it is ignorant as all shit to believe that this is a problem with Islam and people of Middle Eastern origins. But it is also ignorant to avoid this problem and do nothing about it in some kind of constructive matter.

There are no real answers now on how to approach this conflict besides continued drone strikes and covert military operations. But this needs to be a wake up call to the people of the West. I think of the famous "I'm mad as hell" speech from the movie Network... I'm not sure anyone knows what to do right now, because I don't know where I'd begin, but these problems are real. And they are not going to leave you alone. They can't be ignored. Until we can get together as a people and get mad and commit to doing something... this isn't going to go away. And unless we can all say no more, we're just waiting for this to happen again and for it to be worse...

 

[Rugi]

The world should demand mosques of pretty much everywhere to publically denounce these acts in order to break the association of islamic terrorism with the religion. Until then the two will always be associated.

 

[Layell]

The world should demand mosques of pretty much everywhere to publically denounce these acts in order to break the association of islamic terrorism with the religion. Until then the two will always be associated.

You have good intentions here, but this is messed up to "demand"

Does the world require every church to denounce it when christian terrorists kill in the name of religion, or do all smogoners have to apologize when one of us doesn't do so well in a vgc tournament?

Besides the fact 90% of mosques will likely be denouncing this anyways, the same as previous events. But to those who are islamaphobic this will hardly matter.

 

[Adamant Zoroark]

So, condolences to all of the innocent people killed. I mean, I could go on about how awful this is, but... I think that's all self-explanatory.

And, of course, as always, you have both the Islamophobes going to great lengths to attack Muslims and people decrying the previous group. However, if you really want to get at the problem at hand, you have to understand what causes the former group to think the way they do. I'm not going to bother to look for hard numbers as to the motivations of every recent terrorist attack, but when was the last time you heard mainstream media covering some story about the Jews bombing... Uhh... I dunno, Sweden? Germany? Never? Did it even happen? I don't think it happened. You have people hearing about religious fundamentalists doing truly atrocious things like this and the Charlie Hebdo attack in the name of Islam, but it's not so often they hear about religious fundamentalists doing atrocious shit in the name of... Any other religion? Christianity, sure, there was the bombing of abortion clinics, but other religions? I'm having a hard time finding anything.

Think about media coverage of deadly plane crashes making people afraid of flying. Yeah, sure, these plane crashes are deadly, but they are not even close to the typical scenario - flying is safer than driving and yet people don't seem to have a problem with the latter. Think of it as the same thing here - people keep hearing about religious fundamentalists flying planes into towers, or shooting up the headquarters of Charlie Hebdo, or bombing Paris, or whatever the fuck else in the name of Islam, but not so much for other religions other than Christianity (but like 75% of Americans are Christian) so they end up associating terrorism with Islam. Is it rational? Fuck no. But humans are irrational creatures. Basically, people are taking a very teeny-tiny percentage of the Muslim population (like, very small - I wouldn't even claim it's even close to 1%) and judging the entire group based on that, because that's what humans do - the media reports bad news (negativity bias), then people hastily generalize, and then selectively look for evidence that supports the opinion they formed from that hasty generalization (confirmation bias.) Hell, I view all religions in a negative light (mainly due to the fact that all of them indoctrinate children, but that's not the topic at hand) and I can say that the problem is religious fundamentalism, and not religion as a whole. Religious fundamentalism is what causes the Westboro Baptist Church to spew anti-gay hate speech, and what causes ISIS to do heinous shit in the name of Islam like what happened in Paris.

People really should stop blaming Islam as a whole and instead focus on religious fundamentalism - which is a problem with all religions, but in order to get people to stop seeing religious fundamentalism as a Muslim issue and not as something all religions have, we need to get people to understand the biases/irrational behaviors that cause people to hold Islamophobic views - especially hasty generalizations & confirmation bias.

 

[8-BIT Luster]

This is horribly tragic, and my thoughts go out to the victims and the victim's friends and families. Honestly, though, I was shocked but not surprised. Mass violence against major cities for the purpose of spreading terror and hysteria in the name of "religious extremism/fundamentalism" is becoming more and more commonplace. We cant do anything major about it, killing terrorist cells and leaders only incites more violence, and not doing anything allows the violence to continue. Either way, we're fucked.

We really do need to address the issue of religious fundamentalism and differentiating between good, peaceful practitioners of a religion and hateful, evil murderous individuals who use the guise of religion in order to further hate and fear. This is not a religious act, it is pure unadulterated evil.

Blaming Islam is the wrong thing to do. It does nothing but create excuses and ignore the real issue. Waging war is equally wrong. The terrorist groups perpetrating these attacks aren't going to submit. In fact, when we kill leaders of these organizations, we only fuel the hate of Western civilization and once again, provide them even more "justification" for their heinous, monstrous actions.

This is really fucking with my ability to make a coherent post

My personal condolences go out to our French Smogon community, as I know a fair few French speaking and French users.
Stay safe and stay strong.

 

[Rugi]

You have good intentions here, but this is messed up to "demand"

Does the world require every church to denounce it when christian terrorists kill in the name of religion, or do all smogoners have to apologize when one of us doesn't do so well in a vgc tournament?

Besides the fact 90% of mosques will likely be denouncing this anyways, the same as previous events. But to those who are islamaphobic this will hardly matter.

Apologising is different from denouncing and condemning. Important muslims need to speak up adamantly if they don't want their religion to be known as one of terrorism.

 

[Asek]

Apologising is different from denouncing and condemning. Important muslims need to speak up adamantly if they don't want their religion to be known as one of terrorism.

Preface: these events are indeed sad, my condolences to anybody affected by these attacks

The thing is though in the past 2 major attacks I recall the muslim community did indeed condemn the attacks Source 1 Source 2 (cant be bothered finding them for those attacks in africa 3'ish months ago but im sure similar articles would exist). I don't think many people in the western world have a belief that islam is a religion of terror to begin with, as its pretty clear that these attacks are as equally motivated, if not more by politics then religion, and the desire of IS to get a coalition of western countries to invade the middle east again. The islamic community on the whole should feel no extreme need to go out of their way to denounce these actions any more than another group should, as to be frank the islam practised by IS and the one practised by your everyday follower are worlds apart, and are essentially tied in name only

This turn of events does lead to more fuel for pauline hansons rants though, and likely a raise in public support for her to boot, unfortunately!

 

[Yagura]

Apologising is different from denouncing and condemning. Important muslims need to speak up adamantly if they don't want their religion to be known as one of terrorism.

The Moroccan king and Egyptian, Qatari, Iranian, Kuwaiti, and Tunisian presidents (so far, those are the ones I heard about 4 hours ago) all sent letters of condolences to Hollande in which they all expressed that what happened is against humanity and doesn't represent Islam at all.

Terrorism has no religion.

 

[Soul Fly]

Retard exhibit 1:

Blaming refugees for this shit is stupid. And people who do that are more stupid. These people were strapped for food, clothing and shelter, and are in a completely alien land, it is laughable to insinuate that they'd go through the danger, death, and dehumanization of crossing the Mediterranean, getting plenty of shit at the Euro borders and treated for trash like months before some Syrian boy got washed up on the shore. You don't do all that to blow up your host. Not to mention it is unlikely you can suddenly acquire rocket launchers and shit, and also somehow acquire the organizational force to pull of shit like this.

As far as we know we aren't even sure it's ISIS. And I have good reason to believe this isn't, because people tend to forget they're not al-qaeda/mujahideen etc etc. They aren't a guerilla "terrorist" organization in the generic sense, but they rather see themselves as an army: a nation-building force (with the nation being the united Islamic caliphate). And they haven't shown any interest outside the middle east till now.

EVEN IF it is ISIS, or some splinter of the organization, it DOESN'T MATTER. This response tweet sums this up perfectly:

There is only one tangible deducible reason for this attack given the time, place, and context. To stop the flow of immigrants - because the refugee rights are the single most at-risk factor because of these attacks. Be it right-wing elements who don't wan't refugees here, or Islamic fundamentalist elements who don't want them to leave/see them as infidels for going to white-man land, regardless they are the one's being harmed - and whoever wanted the refugees gone/stopped - good fucking job. You have basically set back the refugee crisis rhetoric back a 100 years. Especially since Hollande has made a Bush-esque declaration: 'We are going to lead a war which will be pitiless". Hello EU Patriot Act.

The world is such an unfair place

Also,

The world should demand mosques of pretty much everywhere to publically denounce these acts in order to break the association of islamic terrorism with the religion. Until then the two will always be associated.

Apologising is different from denouncing and condemning. Important muslims need to speak up adamantly if they don't want their religion to be known as one of terrorism.

No. Shut up. That's bullshit. Take that privilege-stick out of your ass and google what "guilt by association" means and don't post again until you understand what that implies, and how hurtful and xenophobic that^ is.
-------

edit@ below: wow lol, if they could do that they wouldn't become REFUGEES you dumbass.

 

[Trax]

Refugees should make their homes better, instead of bringing their problems to the rest of the world. Frankly, the risks are too high at this point.

 

[Aladyyn]

Refugees should make their homes better, instead of bringing their problems to the rest of the world. Frankly, the risks are too high at this point.

And that is why we need to differentiate between refugees and economic migrants. How can refugees make their homes better? Sure as hell not by getting shot at their homes. The problem with the immigrants wasn't the refugees coming, it was the complete inability to regulate the flow of people coming over. And obviously also Germany's complete disregard of everyone else.

 

[jumpluff]

Refugees should make their homes better, instead of bringing their problems to the rest of the world. Frankly, the risks are too high at this point.

My condolences are with France and its people, had a rough year and I think these tragedies will have longer-lasting ramifications. My heart also goes out to Syria and Muslim refugees who will be impacted by this, as well as the Roma who live in France, and p much everyone in Paris, hope everyone on Smogon is okay and their loved ones too.

But seriously Trax: Only if America, France, and NATO allies stop fucking with the homes of refugees. Most of these 'terrorist' groups do not pop out of nowhere, they are used as domestic agents for US imperialism in the Middle East, armed and funded while their countries are torn apart and the rest of the world either a) shrugs b) makes it worse. I'm pretty sure the majority of them would be happier where they were if it was a safe place to live without gross global inequality, which we as Australians benefit from, even poor Australians.

It's not the individual fault of anyone who died today that things are the way they are. But it's absurd to blame refugees as well, since the rest of the world is the reason they have so many problems, and the vast majority of them are utterly innocent, as innocent as we can presume the French. A lot of the countries suspected for 'terrorist activity' have been fucked with recently by the Americans and British redrawing the borders in their areas, provoking civil conflicts and turbulence, interfering with the political will of the masses (and using the opportunity to instil Western-sympathetic leaders), had their regional allies armed or aided by America as threats, been threatened or embargoed, had their wars exacerbated by America, live under the threat of American drones and advanced American military technology being employed in the civil war. Furthermore I would say that given that America, France, etc. are so wealthy is due to the exploitation of poorer countries's resources, money, and labour, the least they can do is take in refugees. How can you seriously look at the disparities and death tallies in Syria and other countries, and the cruel way Western countries treat refugees (who are clearly desperate), and say their problems are theirs alone, when global inequality is the way it is because of Western military and imperial conquest?

Your post is repulsive, sorry. Innocent Parisians don't deserve to die, neither do millions of innocent Syrians. It's very easy for you to sit from where you are in Australia and say refugees should just go back home, while a lot of refugees around Australia itself are the result of Australian imperial intervention and are subject to further barbarity by coming here. Congrats on winning the capitalism lottery by being born in Australia.

And yes I do not differentiate between economic migrants here because their countries cannot remotely hope to better in this state, and if they were stable they would still be at the losing end of US imperialism. How are they to challenge NATO? How do we decide what is an acceptable living standard for people in Syria and then decide we deserve grossly better?

 

[Reddragonn]

Terrorism has no religion.

Right, but terrorists do.

 

[doublenikesocks]

But seriously Trax: Only if America, France, and NATO allies stop fucking with the homes of refugees. Most of these 'terrorist' groups do not pop out of nowhere, they are used as domestic agents for US imperialism in the Middle East, armed and funded while their countries are torn apart and the rest of the world either a) shrugs b) makes it worse.

It's not the individual fault of anyone who died today that things are the way they are. But it's absurd to blame refugees as well, since the rest of the world is the reason they have so many problems, and the vast majority of them are utterly innocent, as innocent as we can presume the French. A lot of the countries suspected for 'terrorist activity' have been fucked with recently by the Americans and British redrawing the borders in their areas, provoking civil conflicts and turbulence, interfering with the political will of the masses (and using the opportunity to instil Western-sympathetic leaders), had their regional allies armed or aided by America as threats, been threatened or embargoed, had their wars exacerbated by America, live under the threat of American drones and advanced American military technology being employed in the civil war. Furthermore I would say that given that America, France, etc. are so wealthy is due to the exploitation of poorer countries's resources, money, and labour, the least they can do is take in refugees. How can you seriously look at the disparities and death tallies in Syria and other countries, and the cruel way Western countries treat refugees (who are clearly desperate), and say their problems are theirs alone, when global inequality is the way it is because of Western military and imperial conquest?

And yes I do not differentiate between economic migrants here because their countries cannot remotely hope to better in this state, and if they were stable they would still be at the losing end of US imperialism. How are they to challenge NATO? How do we decide what is an acceptable living standard for people in Syria and then decide we deserve grossly better?

Cute. I really enjoy how you place the blame for all of the problems of the third world squarely on the West. Mind you, I agree that intervening in the Middle East is the cause of radicalism. However, it's ignorant to ignore other non Western countries completely. How about the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s? Combined Soviet/British invasion of Iran during WWII to install the Shah as the ruler of Iran? Russia propping up its client state of Syria? The Russian intervention in Syria (I know this is very recent but it is a thing that cannot be ignored?) Russia's suppression of Muslim Chechnyan rebels? I could go on and on but it's not just the West causing radicalism in the Middle East. Don't be so ignorant.

 

[billymills]

Yea guys don't forget to blame Putin for this.

 

[doublenikesocks]

Yea guys don't forget to blame Putin for this.

Not blaming Putin. Just pointing out that there are more than one side to every argument.