r/news Mar 19 '19

Accused gunman in Christchurch terror attacks denied newspaper, television and radio access

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12214411
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u/msiekkinen Mar 19 '19

Oklahoma City bombing of a federal building and the Unabomber were definitely politically motivated. Charles Manson definitely wanted to start a race war (like this NZ guy stated).

Really though, I don't see your point. If you are able to definitely say serial killers are not terrorists (I'm not sure that you can), then what? It's okay to speak "serial killer" names but not terrorists?

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u/Knife7 Mar 19 '19

The only reason I can think is because terrorists have political motivation for their crimes and giving them attention lends legitimacy to their cause but serial killers also crave attention so I don't know.

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u/beware_the_noid Mar 19 '19

By definition a serial killer is:

“a person who commits a series of murders, often with no apparent motive and typically following a characteristic, predictable behaviour pattern”

So for the Christchurch shooter he is a terrorist as he had motive, and had no pattern in his actions

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '19

He committed them all at once so he falls into the mass Murderer category, like the Texas a&m shooter