Brutish pigs oppress innocent kid
That’s the impression you’d get if you read this BBC report. It says that a teenager in the UK has been arrested under the Terrorism Act for, wait for it, possessing a copy of the Anarchist Cookbook. According to the story, this appears to be sufficient to warrant charges of “possession of material for terrorist purposes” and “the collection or possession of information useful in the preparation of an act of terrorism”.
Outrage!
“In the UK, possession of the Anarchist’s Cookbook is terrorism,” screams a Slashdotter under the subtle pseudonym Anonymous Terrorist, linking to the BBC piece. The item is tagged with the terms “censorship”, “court”, “politics”, “policestate”, and “fahrenheit451″, which itself constitutes an eloquent editorial.
Of course, only the Jihadis’ useful idiots in the West would believe this. Some of us might think there is something more to the story, given the curious fact that the Anarchist Cookbook is freely available for download online, and Amazon.com unabashedly sells paperback copies for less than $20.
So you go in search of a less biased report, from a rather more competent and less biased organisation than the BBC. Say, the Yorkshire Post.
According to this version, the teenager in question had half a kilo of potassium nitrate under his bed. This is saltpetre, a perfectly legal chemical, useful for curing meat and a number of things other than as an ingredient in explosives. Besides, who hasn’t made firework mischief as a kid with science lab chemicals?”
Fair enough. But there’s more. Like a quarter-kilo of calcium chloride they also found. This is another legal chemical used in refrigeration plants and for road de-icing, but also an ingredient in explosives recipes in the Anarchist Cookbook. And more still: the boy had videos of terrorist attacks and beheadings. Innocent entertainment, no doubt. References to “jihad” were found at the address. Who doesn’t?
The boy had recently travelled to Pakistan. “Oh, so he’s brown-skinned! Racists,” the useful idiots cry.
It is true that all of these things might, on their own, be perfectly legal. Combined, however, they’re mighty suspicious. They’re a fairly strong indication that our boy might not be quite as innocent as the sympathetic BBC story makes him appear. Nevermind whatever details the police chose not to disclose, in order not to jeopardise a potential prosecution.
I’m fairly sure the police didn’t get up one day deciding to make a nuisance of themselves by wasting their time arresting someone just because he’s brownskinned (an assumption that isn’t supported by any information in the media), or to make him a scapegoat. Nor would they bother charging him if they didn’t think there’d be a reasonable chance of a conviction.
It always amazes me: when police don’t stop an attack before it happens and evidence such as this emerges, they are derided as incompetent buffoons who had the evidence right under their noses but couldn’t connect dots a toddler could connect. And when they do, they’re accused of being racist pigs who arrested some innocent rube before they even committed a crime. Can’t win, eh?
What’s important here is the use of the Terrorism Act, which the police are very eager to use on radical Muslim teenagers, but less likely to use against white terrorists.
For example, BNP bombers have been arrested on criminal charges. If these are sufficient to stop right wing extremists, why are they not good enough to stop radical Muslim kids?
Why is it only terrorism if it’s perpetrated by Muslims?
Using the Terrorism Act is overkill that makes the Muslim community feel victimised.
No, what’s important here is that the BBC didn’t mention any of the reasons for the guy’s arrest other than his possession of the Anarchist Cookbook.
I’ll address your irrelevant point anyway, however. Firstly, it’s not only terrorism if it’s perpetrated by Muslims. That’s stating the obvious, perhaps, but consider it stated.
Second, I pointed out explicitly that there is nothing in the news reports that proves the guy they arrested is Muslim, or even Arab. The BBC report in particular is notable not only for omitting most of the reasons for the arrest, but also for containing no information at all that might indicate the suspect’s origin, race or religion. No reference to his apparent interest in Jihad. No mention of his visit to Pakistan. Yet you jump to the conclusion that he’s Muslim. You may want to ask yourself why that is.
As for the difference in approach to “BNP bombers”, I don’t know the specific case to which you refer, so I can’t comment on how it was prosecuted. It appears that whatever they did was fairly simple to prosecute after the fact with ordinary criminal law. Terrorism law, by contrast, is designed to prevent attacks before they happen. This is, of course, a complicated business and fraught with risk and moral hazards, but however you propose to achieve this, it requires a very different set of tools than post facto prosecution of crime. You don’t use terrorism law if simpler prosecutions will suffice.
Consider it like the differences between murder and conspiracy to commit murder. You don’t use conspiracy laws to prosecute a murder, not only because it misses the actual crime, but because it is far more difficult to prove. Different laws serve for different crimes in different circumstances. This isn’t a racist conspiracy by the police against poor oppressed victims.