The arrest of a doctor in at the Gold Coast Hospital near Brisbane, accused of being connected to the failed terror attacks in London and Glasgow, brings international terrorism a lot closer to home than it has ever been before for me. Of course, it’s front page news, and the fact that most of the (alleged) participants in these attacks were doctors is pretty disturbing. Not surprisingly, the hospital’s switchboard was jammed with calls.
Still, my impression is that most people here are taking it in their stride. The risk of being caught up in a terror attack is part of the background of modern life, along with other largely random risks like hit-and-run drivers and street thugs, to name just two. At a policy level (and arguably in terms of moral response, though I think they are all fairly similar cases) these problems are different, and require different responses. But as far as day to day life is concerned, it’s mainly a matter of getting on with it.
Update “Alleged” turns out to be the operative word. The case against the Brisbane doctor apparently turns on the fact that when police tried to interview him about his links to one of the British accused, they found him at the airport with a one-way ticket to India. But it appears he was going there to join his wife who had gone home a week or so earlier after having a baby.
{ 21 comments }
a sentient being 07.03.07 at 1:10 pm
John, what, if anything, are you trying to say here? Why is it so surprising that someone in your town is planning mayhem elsewhere in the world? Isn’t that smarter than living next door to where you plan to strike? And as for this person being doctor, why is that so disturbing. People need to earn a living, and terror masterminds tend to be intelligent people. Is it that you worry your GP might commit an act of terrorism the next time you go for a physical? Is there a point here other than a demonstration that you lead a very sheltered life?
P O'Neill 07.03.07 at 1:51 pm
This morning (US time) Fox News did their special “this just in” gong and slapped the “NEW VIDEO” graphic on the top of the screen. The “NEW VIDEO” consisted of actual footage of Brisbane Airport. It was a nice sunny day, breezy perhaps — and absolutely nothing happening. But doubtless the pavlovian response of their median viewer already had them behind the couch in fear.
Tom 07.03.07 at 2:58 pm
Right, so let’s just get this straight. Some bloke in Australia, who happened to be a doctor (automatically conferring him to a highe plane of morality), may, or may not, have been caught up in a failed bomb plot that took place half way across the planet and you’re just getting on with it? Brave old you, I’d be piling up the sandbags and stockpiling canned goods.
WalterBoswell 07.03.07 at 3:23 pm
Sentient being, terror masterminds? hardly, at least in this case. On the one hand it’s somewhat comforting to see the type of idiots these would be terrorists are (a revolver would have been more effective) and on the other hand quite disturbing to see the type of idiot who gets to be a doctor today.
John 07.03.07 at 3:44 pm
I re-read this five times, just to be sure if wasn’t a spoof post. John can you put me out of my misery, the post was a joke, no?
Rich B. 07.03.07 at 5:10 pm
And as for this person being doctor, why is that so disturbing. People need to earn a living, and terror masterminds tend to be intelligent people.
It is only disturbing if your previous mental image of a ‘terrorist’ was a desperately poor person whose prospects were dropped so low by the yoke of their oppression that there seems little hope beyond terrorism.
It seems to be workable framework if you’re limiting your vision to Palestinian suicide bombers, but when you extend your field of vision to other areas of the world, it appears that “desperate poverty” is only sometimes in conjunction with terrorism, not its cause, and maybe “fighting povety” = “fighting terrorism” isn’t such a true equation.
abb1 07.03.07 at 5:41 pm
I don’t think poverty has anything to do with terrorism. I think it’s more of a case of impressionable people maddened by what they perceive as institutionalized injustice. I can easily imagine a doctor being impressionable.
Rich B. 07.03.07 at 6:57 pm
I don’t disagree with that definition — in practice, though, it appears that engineers are more “impressionable” than doctors, as lots of terrorists seem to be engineering students.
The take-away, however, is that “perceptions of institutionalized injustice” can just as easily manifest themselves as unjust imperialist overlords, unjust capitalist pigs, unjust Western globalizers, or unjust communist socializers. There are inherent injustices in every institution, depending on your view of natural rights.
The conclusion is then not to focus on the injustice, but rather on the perception.
christian h. 07.03.07 at 8:05 pm
Of course, all this discussion is based on incomplete information which in turn relies on official pronouncements of the security services of the UK. The same people who shot to death a Brazilian who was “running away” and “wearing a bulky jacket” – only he didn’t do either, it turned out months later. The same security services that routinely jailed innocent Irishmen because they were, like, totally sure they had the right terrorists. So I’ll reserve judgment.
abb1 07.03.07 at 8:57 pm
The conclusion is then not to focus on the injustice, but rather on the perception.
Not necessarily. After the Oklahoma city bombing – which was a reaction to the Waco incident – they quickly arranged congressional hearings, invited assorted wingnuts, listened to their complaints and immediately changed FBI policies, rules of engagement or whatever they call it. And during the next major incident – the “freemen standoff” in 1996 – the feds didn’t attack, didn’t shoot anyone, they waited. That was the longest siege in the US history, and it ended peacefully, and so that one did not provoke any terrorism. So, it is possible to focus on actual institutions, the ways they operate.
Hidari 07.03.07 at 9:36 pm
I live in Glasgow and I can tell you now that the overwhelming reaction of the vast majority of people has been…’Yeah? So?’. I mean a burning car, and a fist fight? Average Saturday night on Sauchiehall Street.
I might add that the actual, real, flooding and aberrant weather patterns we have seen in the last few weeks (and the last few years), evidence for the increasing pace of Global Warming (which is almost certainly going to lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps millions of people, more, in other words, than any conceivable terror attack) has been, mysteriously, not highlighted by the Corporate media in the way that images of a burning truck in Glasgow airport (number of fatalities: zero) have been zoomed round the world.
In a way it demonstrates, yet again, the incompetence of these terrorists and demonstrates that terrorism should be added to car making, computer manufacturing and having a working transport system, in the long list of things the British simply can’t do anymore.
I mean they picked Glasgow airport. If only they had picked Glasgow Prestwick, most people would stood around and cheered. Christ what a dump.
As for the idea that the fact that doctors kill people might be shocking…I’m sorry?
Dr Shipman you are being paged.
P O'Neill 07.03.07 at 9:57 pm
In the spirit of #9, let’s take one strange aspect of the Brisbane angle. We are variously told that the detainee is (a) a citizen of India who (b) was holding a one-way ticket for a trip to Pakistan. The little matter of a visa makes that a very difficult trip. Maybe he had that sorted out. But it would be better if the hacks were showing signs of asking such questions.
jet 07.03.07 at 11:50 pm
Those mocking John Quiggin seem to miss the point of terrorism. We can’t all be purely rational transcendent humanists who brush off terror as statistically inconsequential to themselves. Terrorism is supposed to cause terror, tautologically speaking. And I’m sure it eases the minds of the scared to know their trusty intellectual superiors are out there mocking them, and how
hurricanesheavy rain is the real boogy man.And I like the newly minted meme that 7 immigrant doctors conspiring and acting to blow up a bunch of “slags” at a night club isn’t anything new. I guess the “poverty caused it” meme took a huge blow, and we can’t have the hoi poi questioning what is fed to them.
You didn’t know Dokkkters kill? OMG hahaha, Custer was a dokkter a thousand years ago and killed a bunch of whales with nukes you tards!
Cleve Blakemore 07.04.07 at 5:48 am
It’s not like Australians are the world’s deepest thinkers to begin with. Ozzies are in fact no better or worse than the sweet oblivious consumer units in America, both groups of shoppers come in around avg. IQ of 97 on both continents.
When the inevitable attack comes, as it surely will, there will be no end of recriminations and accusations of laxity in performance of duties however ambiguously defined they may be. At the end of the day however, the real culprit will be that Western people in general just don’t think ahead much into the future any more or consider their posterity. They react like animals to something when it happens and no sooner.
What really separates us from the lower animals is our capacity to imagine the natural long term consequences of our actions and prepare accordingly. That capacity has gone missing in the Western populations over the past twenty years. It vanished along with the ability to read, write and speak in complete sentences. Somebody somewhere must have gotten all that surplus, mayhaps in Switzerland.
tom 07.04.07 at 6:57 am
“Terrorism is supposed to cause terror, tautologically speaking”
So if no-ones scared or hurt is it terrorism? People were far more scared about losing their homes to biblical floods than a few looneys with a chemistry set. This isn’t belittling the very few who are scared, it’s the reality.
Hidari 07.04.07 at 7:28 am
‘Terrorism is supposed to cause terror, tautologically speaking.’
And it only succeeds in its aim if the media goes completely bananas and turns a minor, incompetent and failed ‘terror attack’ into the most evil and horrifying plot since 9/11.
But then the media are supposed to print lies, tautologically speaking.
jet 07.04.07 at 2:57 pm
“But then the media are supposed to print lies, tautologically speaking.” Heh, like that.
John Quiggin 07.04.07 at 7:29 pm
Obviously, I didn’t express myself very well on this one. Of course, the actual risk was minimal, I was just surprised, given past experience of the effect of media beatups of this kind of thing that, no one much seemed to get upset about it.
Planeshift 07.04.07 at 7:55 pm
Its actually quite comical that allegedly intelligent people (doctors) failed to cause a single explosion with 3 cars packed full of gas. I mean did they buy the bombs from BAE systems or something?
And I am supposed to be afraid of them?
With incompetence on this scale the only sane response is laughter.
Dave 07.05.07 at 3:28 am
Regarding the following comment;
I mean they picked Glasgow airport. If only they had picked Glasgow Prestwick, most people would stood around and cheered. Christ what a dump.
Do you fly RyanAir much? Classic comment – after being stuck at that airport in question last year I must agree.
derrida derider 07.05.07 at 3:28 am
The Brisbane doctor has been detained for questioning, not arrested. The distinction is important – even the security authorities have publicly said that he might not be implicated at all. In fact at this stage it looks as though he was detained mainly because he knew some of the UK ‘bombers’ and happened to be leaving the country.
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