Trolling Al Qaeda... For Peace?

The Mister Purple writes "There is a small initiative underway to combat Islamic militant recruiting on the Internet... by trolling them. Quoting the article: 'The program, called Viral Peace, seeks to occupy the virtual space that extremists fill, one thread or Twitter exchange at a time. Shahed Amanullah, a senior technology adviser to the State Department and Viral Peace's creator, tells Danger Room he wants to use "logic, humor, satire, [and] religious arguments, not just to confront [extremists], but to undermine and demoralize them." Think of it as strategic trolling, in pursuit of geopolitical pwnage.' So, does this mean that I'm promoting peace when I post YouTube comments?"

Comments

Right

[Anonymous Coward]

Because pissing people off is an effective way to get them to leave you alone.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

Confusion is a great tactic. Make them so mad they can't think straight, and you reduce their total effectiveness.

See also political arguments, religious arguments, battle of the sexes, etc etc.

Re:Right

[dwarfsoft]

Even logical argument wont work due to cognitive dissonance and a desire to hold on to your values despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Satire would probably just rile them up more.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

Because pissing people off is an effective way to get them to leave you alone.

It's not designed to work on the nuts, it's designed to work on the ones the nuts are trying to recruit.

Making the nuts look like idiots hurts their recruiting.

Re:Right

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Well, I've been doing precisely this for years, actually. In fact, just using your brain properly pisses these people off incredibly efficiently.

Satire would probably just rile them up more.

Been there, done that. This stuff is pretty much work in progress.

Re:Right

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

But?!?!?

If you disable Al Qaeda, how will you get them to overthrow Assad in Syria for Hillary?

You must understand one thing. "Al Qaeda" never stopped being a board piece used by "Western" powers, when they were Reagan's Moral equivalent of our founding fathers."

If you dispute this, it's because YOU have already been trolled into disinformed confusion...

Re:Right

[jhoegl]

Epic troll crit

Re:Right

[amicusNYCL]

It's not designed to work on the nuts

NUT ON! APPLY DIRECTLY TO THE NUTS!

Re:Right

[DigiShaman]

It's like Warcraft. If you keep clicking on the sheep, they will eventually explode in frustration. So keep trolling them. If we're lucky, they will explode in their own home just behind the keyboard.

Re:Right

[Charliemopps]

Take it from someone that's practically got a PhD in pissing people off... I've very lonely.

Re:Right

[MightyYar]

I don't think Regan was talking about the future.

Re:Right

[russotto]

It's not designed to work on the nuts, it's designed to work on the ones the nuts are trying to recruit.

Right... the nuts are working on stirring up the mark's religious fervor, and inserting "Penis" in the middle of the conversation sort of ruins the mood.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

"inserting penis" never seems to ruin the mood for me ;-)

Re:Right

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Because pissing people off is an effective way to get them to leave you alone.

A visit from 4chan is unlikely to do much about the 'currently at a training camp in hellholistan learning to use RPGs' crowd; but suitably competent trolling can reduce an online community to little more than flame wars and tumbleweeds fairly quickly.

It might annoy the wannabes enough that they give up and just go look at porn or something instead. People aren't known for their dedication or attention spans on the internet.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

Religious groups understand that children must be indoctrinated at a young age in order for anything they are told to stick (be it God, aliens or some other folklore). No amount of rationalizing will convince someone that their religion or beliefs are flawed. Extend this to coca-cola - people won't change their beliefs (in this instance, they wouldn't drink Pepsi).

You won't stop this fanaticism with logic or humor.

Re:Right

[hoggoth]

Are you still touching me?

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

If you dispute this, it's because YOU have already been trolled into disinformed confusion...

Regardless of what their position is, anyone who says this is more confused and misinformed than the people he's accusing of the same.

Re:Right

[eugene ts wong]

In other words, you are saying that there have been no attempts at making them look like idiots. Perhaps you are saying that there were attempts, but the attempts weren't successful.

You are definitely saying that if you make somebody feel like an idiot, then he won't want to be recruited to blow you up to bits.

I am confident that if I look through books on how to win friends and influence people, then somewhere in bold letters will be the suggestion to humiliate your enemies until world peace arrives.

Yeah, I think that is it. There are too many wars due to lack of humiliation.

Re:Right

[vivian]

Actually I think if they just got laid once in a while it'd reduce their effectiveness. Unfortunately for them their belief system makes them think the only way it's going to happen is to get married or get martyred.
Given their apparently poor respect of women, the former isn't likely without some kind of arranged marriage.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

It worked when Superman defeated the KKK. They gave out the secret codes etc and made them look so childish that members became ashamed to associate, and to this day many people think of the KKK as childish, uneducated, illiterate fools.

Re:Right

[Centurix]

Not such pissing them off, more getting them in a tissy. Spacked out terrorists confused about where to put the stick of TNT.

If they could redirect 4chan posts to the Taliban they'd be all rainbows and unicorns.

Re:Right

[causality]

which is essentially sows distrust of everything that comes from TV, Radio and the Internet.

That would be an improvement. Why, somthing like widespread critical thinking might emerge! The world is full of people who benefit by being dishonest.

in other words, you create in the other person the sentiment that IT'S ALL BULLSHIT.

All? No. Just most of it. Usually this is in the "bought and paid for" sense of advertisements. Half-truths are always a popular one as well, because on the surface they seem legitimate unless you scrutinize how they're being used. It tends to fool people who are otherwise smart except that they're naive.

then they're drawn to someone who strikes down that FUD, in person, face to face.

What would lead them to believe this person is any more truthful than what they read? At some point they'd have to learn to test the truth of information they are told to believe. Otherwise we're back again to the naive people, the ones who (no matter how high their IQs) get suckered by charm and charisma. Or they might get suckered by thinking those who look you in the eye are automatically more truthful than someone who writes a post online, even though meeting a single liar is enough to falsify that notion.

then you end up with exactly what you seeked to defuse in the first place

No the real problem here is that both government and corporations find it highly desirable to have malleable, docile populace who don't question too much or think too critically. Politicians think that's just great and so do advertisers. They'd really rather not rock that boat. That's why they want to counter one kind of propaganda with another kind of propaganda instead of teaching people how to recognize propaganda and identify ulterior agendas.

Besides, you frame this in terms of "distrust". I went along with that in order to respond to you more easily, but I don't view it that way at all. It's not about trust or distrust or mistrust. It's about skepticism. Healthy skepticism is a good thing. If you aren't willing to go wherever the evidence and reason leads, then we're moving away from skepticism and towards mistrust. That's the difference.

Re:Right

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Yes.

Look how I use "quotes".

Re:Right

[Black Parrot]

As in Kent Brockman's "How can I prove we're live?"

Re:Right

[Nyder]

It's not designed to work on the nuts, it's designed to work on the ones the nuts are trying to recruit.

Right... the nuts are working on stirring up the mark's religious fervor, and inserting "Penis" in the middle of the conversation sort of ruins the mood.

or vagina

Re:Right

[Mike Buddha]

Mujahadeen != Al Quaeda, you racist pig.

Re:Right

[SoftwareArtist]

You know the religious fanatics who stand in the middle of college campuses shouting at everyone passing by that the end of the world is coming, and they're all going to Hell, and generally making fools of themselves? And you know how people laugh at them, or shout back at them, or make jokes about them to the crowd, or point out loudly what absurd fools they are?

That's exactly what they want to happen.

You see, they aren't targeting those people who stand around and laugh at them. But somewhere in the crowd is someone who feels sorry for them. Someone who knows perfectly well they're a religious fanatic, but that still doesn't give people the right to laugh at them. And so afterward that person will go up and talk to the religious fanatic, just to be polite, just to say, "I wasn't one of the people laughing at you, and I don't approve of them doing it."

And that is who they're really targeting. That person who is trying to be polite, and is off their guard, and who suddenly finds the religious fanatic is actually a friendly person who can talk intelligently and doesn't sound like a fanatic at all anymore. By laughing at the fanatic, you helped them to lure in the person they were really after, and gave them a chance to give the real recruiting pitch.

Trolling fanatics may be fun, but it can easily have the opposite effect from what you intend.

Re:Right

[UltimaBuddy]

And that is why you fail.

Re:Right

[Zantetsuken]

Which works right up until they tell the people they are preaching to "Look! See, I told you they would try to make us look stupid, its because they hate us!"

OTOH, I guess you've gotta try what you can - and if at least the semi-intelligent on up see that the recruiter was dumb enough to fall for a troll, they'll loose faith. As long as they don't use this to recruit, say 3 or 4 times the people who didn't join up...

Re:Right

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

:-)

Re:Right

[kentrel]

You know that trolling doesn't mean ridiculing someone?

Trolling is a fine art, and often it means gaining someone's trust, and provoking an emotional reaction you want, but not necessarily drawing attention to yourself as the troll.

Re:Right

[Dr Max]

Problem is the Americans will get trolled back and considering they have murdered more innocents, and ruined more lives, while profiting on it, and just generally being hypocritical, some of them wont handle it.

Re:Right

[SuperAnt]

You have been "doing" what?

Insulting all muslims and their faith and "combating Islamic militant recruiting on the internet" are two very different things.

Re:Right

[lennier]

Yeah, I think that is it. There are too many wars due to lack of humiliation.

Sadly if one were to rewatch most American movies aimed at teenagers since the 1980s, I think you'll find the predominant cultural moral message has been pretty much exactly that.

Act 1: A young wimpy kid/cop/spy/soldiert is pushed around by bullies/criminals/Soviets/terrorists.
Act 2: The bullies continue to push the wimp who is tragically plagued by common sense/compassion/robots. This nearly loses the lunch money/case/mission/Vietnam.
Act 3: Pushed to the wall, the young wimp faces his/her deep inner fears of his/her own glorious American manifest destiny. Hoo-rah!
Act 4: The former wimp utterly humiliates the enemy in the most embarrassing way possible with a devastating rock solo. This ends all wars everywhere and there is no such thing as blowback, at least until the sequel.

I'm pretty sure that if this formula worked for Marty McFly and Rambo, it will work for the United States diplomatic corps.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

You know that trolling doesn't mean ridiculing someone?

Trolling is a fine art, and often it means gaining someone's trust, and provoking an emotional reaction you want, but not necessarily drawing attention to yourself as the troll.

I was going to post exactly the same thing - thank you for your insightful comment. I think it's important that you contribute to this forum, because it's people like you who make this place special. Clearly you are exactly the kind of person who beats their children, and as a fellow child abuser I applaud your courage to go public with your righteous justice.

Re:Right

[flyneye]

There are no "tactics" that will work with any of the invincibly ignorant.
Take for instance, extreme Westboro Baptists, who have been reasoned with, taunted, stalked, given a voice in the press, ridiculed on t.v., forced to protest behind barriers of "Patriot Guard" bikers, and generally opposed in both good and bad ways, still they carry on....Nothing works that doesn't make you a lower scumbag than them.

Re:Right

[Phroggy]

You never touch the other elves like that.

Re:Right

[terjeber]

Read about Stetson Kennedy and the KKK.

Re:Right

[Concerned Onlooker]

You have given yourself away as a member of the Taliban.

So, would you like to see my photo collection of burning Qurans?

Re:Right

[q.kontinuum]

The art if trolling is to make them embarrass themselves, not to insult them directly. Asking the right questions in a sincere tone etc. Make them speak about the weak points in their quest, the things they might rather not mention in a recruiting campaign. The thin line between open discussion and good trolling is that the art of trolling includes the concepts of intentionally misunderstanding the others point, carefully associate them with groups you know they don't completely agree with (e.g. Confront a sunnit with views more related to schiits, claiming them to be well known Moslem views, confronting a christian with Moslem views (and vive versa), claiming they are well known views of Yahwes followers, ...). Trolling - if done right - can be very effective to make people destroy themselves and their reputation.

Cheap name-calling or "My Jesus is bigger than Your Mohammed" would probably be counter-productive.

Re:Right

[hairyfeet]

The problem is religious extremists really need deprogramming not trolling. We are talking about people that will strap a bomb to their chest and die with a smile on their face because of what some goat herder wrote on a piece of sheep's ass a thousand years ago. Now just think about that for a minute, a guy that has been dead for over a thousand years tells you that if you die for the sky bully you'll be pimped out in paradise....and you listen.

I'm sorry but until we can get people to accept those stories for what they were, stories, no different than Homer or Plato, then its seriously doubtful that anything you troll is gonna have any long term effect. we are talking about a religion that tells you how many times to shake your dick after you piss and how to fuck your wife you know, people that desire THAT level of external control in their lives have serious mental problems and need help.

I personally think its because religion takes responsibility completely out of your life, it doesn't matter what happens its "God's will" and you have no reason to think or claim responsibility, just follow this little rule book and don't think and all is well. It completely takes any thought or responsibility out of the person's hands and sadly there are many of our fellow man that would like to spend their entire lives not having to think, just blindly follow.

Re:Right

[AmiMoJo]

Many of the extremists are married. In fact the wife of the one of the 7/7 bombers was up for assisting him as the police claimed she must have known he was planning something and didn't report it.

Personality and love have nothing to do with it, only families marrying off daughters for political reasons in the hope of improving their standing and creating alliances. Wives are basically livestock that you trade and use for breeding.

Re:Right

[mlush]

Because pissing people off is an effective way to get them to leave you alone.

The people being pissed off are already radically pissed off, a little trolling is not going to make much difference... OTOH making them appear aggressive and irrational online should make it harder to groom new recruits.

Re:Right

[AmiMoJo]

And that is who they're really targeting. That person who is trying to be polite, and is off their guard, and who suddenly finds the religious fanatic is actually a friendly person who can talk intelligently and doesn't sound like a fanatic at all anymore. By laughing at the fanatic, you helped them to lure in the person they were really after, and gave them a chance to give the real recruiting pitch.

That's how it works on TV but not in real life. The basic tactic is to get the victim into a situation where they can be bombarded with religious bullshit for years on end and surrounded by others who seem to believe it totally. It isn't unique to Islam either, most monotheistic religions prefer to get people in young and hammer them for years so they become true and unshakable believers. It isn't even unique to religion, extremist groups of all kinds do it.

There is no logic, no rational argument, just relentless indoctrination.

Re:Right

[jaymemaurice]

Not to ignorant people who know nothing about what they are speaking about... yet they still speak.

Re:Right

[marcello_dl]

That is clear to me. Telling Al Qaeda that you're trolling them is the less clear part.

Re:Right

[equex]

Trolling is a subset of social engineering :)

Re:Right

[bryan1945]

Haven't been reading about the Penn State scandal?

Re:Right

[bryan1945]

Or "Better Off Dead", "Karate Kid", "Breakfast Club", "Ferris Beuller."

Re:Right

[lxs]

Come off it. Vivian is a guy's name.

Re:Right

[Anonymous Coward]

Every time fundies would come to campus and do this, I would always buy them sealed water bottles and hand them out. They were always skeptical, but I told them to check the seals -- they didn't have anything to worry about. Thus reassured (and likely enjoying a cool drink at this point) they would inevitably thank me for my kindness and ask God to bless me. I would tell them that they're very welcome and tell them that I'm an atheist, then immediately walk away.

I always enjoyed doing this, because it was a non-confrontational way to make them question whether the people they were demonizing were really so bad.

Re:Right

[Crosshair84]

Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.

These people are not blowing themselves up BECAUSE of their religion, that does play some part into it yes, but that is not the main driving reason. I paid attention in history class, I don't remember Muslims sending fire ships into New York Harbor in the 1880's. I don't remember suicide car bombings in the 1930's. I remember some piracy off their shores and that was about it. If religion was the DRIVING force we would have seen these past events, but we don't.

The reason they attack us today is because for the last 50 years we have been meddling in their internal affairs. We have installed/propped up dictators who have brutalized and oppressed their people for decades. They know that until the US has been driven from the region they will not have self rule. The purpose of 9/11 was to get the US more deeply involved and more easily attacked. They have told us their goals repeatedly, bankrupt the US Soviet Union style to force it to leave the region forever.

Why the suicide attacks? Because the US supported/influenced tyrants have made life so miserable that these people have nothing to lose. If they lined up as a regular army they know they would get slaughtered, so why not just go for a suicide attack and do far more damage. Either method ends in death. Self rule is worth dying for, so they make the very rational choice to sacrifice themselves for the future of their people to have the ability to rule themselves. If the roles were reversed you'd see Americans lining up around the corner to strap on the bomb belts for the same reasons and you and I would be cheering them on for their bravery.

Re:Right

[Firemouth]

Me not that kind of orc!

Re:Right

[stdarg]

You have to care about the subject matter to fall for trolling. Like your post could be trolling people who care about America's image in terms of whether it kills innocent people etc. Someone might respond to you acting all indignant about how America's not like that, or other places are so much worse. Others don't care because they know America's history and are proud of it.

That's why I don't get how this is going to work with al Qaeda. What on earth are people going to say to make them feel emotional and defensive? And what makes people think that al Qaeda's emotional reply to trolling won't be even more inspiring to onlookers?

Re:Right

[stdarg]

That might work for some wannabees. It seems to me that at least some of the people looking online at jihad sites and who are actually interested in it are more likely to pick sides in a flame fest than leave in disgust.

They'll have to be very careful to make their trolling uninteresting and non-inflammatory, which doesn't even make sense. That's not how you troll.

Frankly I don't see how this is going to work. I'm hoping that they are using the word "troll" in a different sense than how I understand it. Unfortunately the article didn't give any examples so who knows.

Re:Right

[K. S. Kyosuke]

You have been "doing" what?

Using logic and reason when discussing such matters as the origin of mankind, Earth, the nature of the universe we live in...

Insulting all muslims and their faith...

...is a side effect of doing the former, but it's them who get offended and not me offending them. Any person with a working brains surely understands this distinction. To put it in different words, I treat all people in discussion the same - I assume that all parties to the discussion are willing to use the brain in an intellectually honest way, but for some reasons there are a few population groups that are not OK at all with this notion, and Muslims are one of them.

Re:Right

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Exactly.

Controlling is to definite a term. I like "playing"

Re:Right

[digitalsolo]

Just curious, as an American...

How many people have I murdered? Lives ruined?

And if I'm profiting, my check must be lost in the mail.

Re:Right

[kaizokuace]

High level trolling is indistinguishable from the worst sociopaths. CEOs, corportate execs, etc. troll their way to the top. They just get rich so it sounds like Trololololo.

Re:Right

[eugene ts wong]

I don't that that it applies to those movies. The US pushes its weight around the world and humiliates people. Are you saying that those people should win in the end?

Re:Right

[mrex]

>Confusion is a great tactic. Make them so mad they can't think straight, and you reduce their total effectiveness.

It's a great tactic in war, not so much as a way for the civilian public to operate in peacetime, against other civilians.

The most likely consequence of ruining discussions on the public internet is simply to move those discussions off the public internet, which then becomes solely an outlet for both sides' contrived propaganda, robbing the public of the value of watching and participating in the dialog.

In the long term, this is just shooting ourselves in the foot.

Re:Right

[Dr Max]

1940s - nuked Japan.

Death toll: 145,000 to date in Nagasaki, 250,000 in Hiroshima

1947-49 - U.S. helps command extreme-right Greece party in Civil War.

Death toll: about 70,000 contributed by US-backed forces

1948-54 - CIA directs war against Huk Rebellion in Philippines.

Death toll: about 11,000

1950 - Independence movement crushed in Ponce, Puerto Rico

Death toll: conservative historians estimated about 8,000 peasants

1950-53 - Korean War

Death toll: about 1,776,000

1952 - CIA overthrows Democracy in Iran, installs Shah

Death toll: about 20,000

1954 - CIA directs invasion of Guatemala after new Democracy there nationalized U.S.-occupied lands

Death toll: about 140,000 missing and dead

1958 - In Lebanon, marine occupation against rebels

Death toll: about 2,000

1960-75+ - Vietnam War including Cambodia and Laos

Death toll: about 4,502,000 including civilians and resulting famines (conservative estimates)

1961 - Cuba's Bay of Pigs Invasion fails

Death toll: about 4,000

1963 - In Iraq, CIA organizes coup against President and agrees to back formerly exiled Saddam

Death toll: about 7,000 including civilians

1964 - In Panama, troops kill protesters against US-owned canal

Death toll: about 1,000

1965 - CIA assists Indonesian coup

Death toll: about 900,000

1966 - Troops and bombers threaten pro-communist parties in Dominican Republic

Death toll: about 3,000

1966-96 - Green berets in Guatemala against rebels, US backs pro-American forces in country until 1996

Death toll: about 200,000

1970 - Directs marine invasion of Oman

Death toll: about 2,000

1973 - CIA directs coup to oust elected Marxist president in Chile

Death toll: 30,000... 3,000 later disappeared under US-installed dictator

1976-92 - CIA assists South-African rebels in Angola

Death toll: median estimate at 550,000

1981-90 - CIA directs Contra invasions in Nicaragua

Death toll: median estimate at 30,000

1982-84 - Marines expel Lebanese rebels, aided by Israel

Death toll: 40,000

1987-88 - US intervenes for Iraq against Iran

Death toll: about 150,000 during time-frame, 100,000 during Desert Storm, 350,000 from resulting famine

1989 - US invades to oust CIA-installed Panamanian government gone rouge

Death toll: 2,000

1992-94 - US-led occupation of Somalia during civil war

Death toll: 50,000 in combat, 300,000 by starvation

2001+ - US Occupies Afghanistan

Death toll: 120,000 including civilians and combatants and resulting Opium Wars

2003+ - Iraqi War

Death toll: 665,000 also by starvation, displacement

TOTAL: 10,431,000

And that doesn't even include POWs, classified information, and WW2 pre-nuke!

Re:Right

[Dr Max]

and yes you profited. That's why the american style of life has been so much higher than the rest of the world. You get your check every time you fill up your gas tank. I don't actually think the american public is that bad (although if you run around trying to justify everything as trolls the extremists may connect the two) it's just a government that you can't control.

Re:Right

[Dr Max]

good point.

Re:Right

[adamofgreyskull]

1989 - US invades to oust CIA-installed Panamanian government gone rouge

Ooh-la-la!

Re:Right

[jaymemaurice]

Since people keep moding me down because they don't believe or agree - the point is, these people could be radicals under christain beliefs, buddist beliefs or even aliens. I don't make this shit up.
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-01-05/world/pakistan.taliban.children_1_suicide-bombers-taliban-heaven?_s=PM:WORLD

Re:Right

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Most likely by budding or other means of vegetative reproduction.

Re:Right

[KingBenny]

for the lulz, yea , let's have a wallstreet drumcircle around the suicide bomber to contain the damage then, shall we. Viral peace huh ... i think this strain will mutate and come back to eat its creators alive. Undermine a religious fanatic with logic to demoralize him ... sorry for the caps but i can't hold it R O F L M A O
it gets points for giving me a good laff tho

Re:Right

[digitalsolo]

Holy hell, I killed a ton of people before I was born!

I should look into becoming a contract killer apparently.

Re:Right

[Dr Max]

I apologies i didn't mean you personally, and i know many if not most Americans are great people. It's not like you have a choice in the matter, but a good chunk of the money your forced to give in tax is to support this killing. My point is if you start trolling the terrorist, they will only see it as support for your countries own evil.

Re:Right

[digitalsolo]

That was the point I was trying to make. I generally like my country (and by country, I mean the people I share it with) but I strongly disagree with the direction and decisions made by our government (which creates a "Catch 22" since it is a representation of its people).

This whole theory (trolling the terrorist) seems like many others. A novel intention, unlikely to create the results they expect.

Re:Right

[Crosshair84]

So do you deny the historic fact that the US has supported and propped up dictators in the region for the last 50 years?

Do you deny the historic fact that these US supported dictators have oppressed and brutalized their own people?

Do you deny the historic fact that the people in the Middle East didn't give two sh*ts about the west until after WWII when the US and Soviet union began interviewing in the region. Like I said before, Muslims have not attacked the west since the middle ages, no fire ships being sailed into harbors during the 1700's, no bombings and arson in the 1800's, no mass shootings during the early 1900's. If the "TEY HAT US FUR UR FREEDOOM" was true they they should have been attacking us from the beginning of the US republic. Yet they haven't.The ire towards the US only started after 1953 when we started intervening in the internal affairs of the region. Before that it was towards the British, who prominently controlled the region.

Do you deny the fact that Bin Laden has told us, REPEATEDLY and PUBLICLY, WHY he is attacking us. In case you've never looked for it.

1. U.S. support for Israel that keeps Palestinians in the Israelis' thrall.
2. U.S. and other Western troops on the Arabian Peninsula.
3. U.S. support for Russia, India, and China against their Muslim militants.
4. U.S. pressure on Arab energy producers to keep oil prices low.
5. U.S. support for apostate, corrupt, and tyrannical Muslim governments.

Whether or not you agree with those motivations or believe they are true or not, THAT is why they are attacking the US. The propaganda "TEY HAT US FUR UR FREEDOOM" doesn't even pass the smell test and is demonstrably false with even a little digging.

Re:Right

[Crosshair84]

Yea, because there are SOOO many Catholics, Hindus and Buddhists in Al Qaeda.

Re:Right

[Crosshair84]

Yeah it is real rational to go blow up a school bus filled with children. That is completely void of bravery and overflowing with cowardice.

It is an INCREDIBLY rational thing to do. There are 2 ways to win a war:

1. Destroy your enemies ability to wage war, either militarily or economically.
2. Destroy your enemies political will to fight.

There are no rules in war. If you are not willing to accept that then don't go to war in the first place and don't pursue foreign policy that will result in war. We may try to put some lipstick on that pig with the Geneva Conventions and what not, but it's nothing but window dressing to hide the ugly reality. If you want to win and you think you can do that by bombing school buses and shopping centers then you'd be an idiot not to. History doesn't care who had the moral high ground, only who won.

I personally don't want to go to war and thus want to peruse policies that will minimize any chance of war. I want a foreign policy of national DEFENSE, not offense.

Up until recently we were simply lucky enough to have a large buffer zone between us and the islamist fanatics (another commenter already pointed out the historic exceptions in the Barbary Wars, where our buffer was reduced by our absurd desire for the freedom to trade in Europe--these WARS cannot be written off simply as "piracy off their shores"--just as it is today, it was state-sponsored terrorism and extortion that deserved a military response).

There are about 2.6 million Muslims in the US. Explain why we are not having bombings every day across the US? The answer is that while they may share the same religion as those in the Middle East, they do not share the same socioeconomic grievances as people in the Middle East and recent immigrants to Europe.

Also, the timing is way off as the "buffer" was largely gone by the mid 1800's with the advent of steam travel, plenty of trade was going on with the region. We should have seen a gradual increase in attacks from then to now if religion was the primary motivator, but we don't. (Especially after 1863 when dynamite was invented.)

Another point is that until we started intervening they were quite content to kill each other. The WORST thing you can do for a largely tribal population who likes killing their enemies is to give all of them a common enemy. After we leave, which we ultimately will, within one generation they will go back to fighting among themselves.

Do you ever wonder what else you didn't learn in history class? Maybe you should realize that your learning should not have stopped with your shitty education, before you imply that others did not pay attention.

Who said it did? I was obviously being facetious. You can continue to misunderstand the enemy as long as you want, just accept that you will lose every war. The US lost Vietnam because of that sort of hubris and we've lost in the Middle East for the same reasons. First, we aren't willing to fight to win. If we wanted to win we would have plastered the borders of Afghanistan and Iraq with a few hundred million landmines to stop the flow of fighters. Don't like that? Then don't go to war. (Actually, if we wanted to win we couldn't have gone into Iraq in the first place.) Second, we don't even bother to understand why our enemy is fighting and waddle right into their trap. It would be one thing if it was the politicians who were getting killed because of that, but it's not.

Finally!

[54mc]

My skills will be put to use!

Re:Finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

The first time "Troll" and "Insightful" are valid on-topic moderations!

Re:Finally!

[Centurix]

Troll + Insightful = Funny

That's how the palette of Slashdot mod points work.

Re:Finally!

[WindBourne]

You just have to learn arabic, pashto, farsi, etc, etc, etc.

Re:Finally!

[formfeed]

Question is, will the US intelligence forces know the difference between irony and terrorist supporter - or just raid your house anyway?

Re:Finally!

[DigiShaman]

Troll + Informative = Flamebate? Truth hurts.

Re:Finally!

[digitalsolo]

Flamebate seems like a good way to burn one's crotch.

Religious Cartoons

[bugs2squash]

They always go down well

be very careful

[busyqth]

Be very careful when participating in this type of activity, because if you really annoy Al Qaida terrorists, they try to get revenge in some way.
For example, they might DDoS your server, or dox you, of any number of other similarly terrifying acts.

Not to sound like a meany:

[Anonymous Coward]

But this is the dumbest idea I ever heard. If anything, tweaking in this ineffectual manner would only steel their resolve.

"I was going to blow up a school full of kids, but someone showed me the goatse guy, and I thought better of it." Not likely.

Waste of Time

[Anonymous Coward]

it never worked on [Republicans, Democrats] (delete as per preference) so why should it work on fundies?

Re:Waste of Time

[eugene ts wong]

Why do you say, "fundies"? Is it because humiliation always persuades you? Is it a good use of time, when we do it to moderates, libertarians, scientists, pacifists, and the politically disenfranchised?

Amanullah...

[zrbyte]

Get ready to nullahfy terrorists!

Re:Slashdot's reallyghone down hill....

[Anonymous Coward]

Later, Marilynn, my little girl was taken away from me because of my drunkenness and drug use. I became pregnant again, this time I tried to terminate the pregnancy by throwing myself down thirty concrete steps in a warehouse where I worked. I was given a “therapeutic abortion” after seeing two physiatrists.

My life was a mess, I would do so many drugs that I would wake up in strange places, bruised, raped and at times left to die. Along with the drugs, I began to get deeper into witchcraft and meditate. I would invite strange spirits to come inside my body and empower me. I was possessed by more then ten demons.

Just ten demons? Pussy.

Let me help...

[bhlowe]

This is a good war porn action.. Its begging for some peace through trolling comments.

Re:Slashdot's reallyghone down hill....

[Antipater]

That's nothing compared to the experience I had with MyCleanPC.

Bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

State-sponsored trolling is never a good idea. The police should investigate crimes and with some measure also attempt to prevent them. The purpose of intelligence agencies is to gather intelligence. Neither of this involves trolling around on online forums.

It's a plot!

[ggpauly]

by Jimmy Carter

Re:Slashfuck bitches are too limp to do this

[VIPERsssss]

Religion of Peace

Dirka Dirka

[ilikenwf]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOo06EOLBuY Baka-bakalaka dirka dirka, Mohammed Jihad! :)

Re:While I'm all for trolling Muslims

[Ziekheid]

Not sure if troll or actually serious. Well played.

Re:While I'm all for trolling Muslims

[Halo1]

While I'm all for trolling Muslims

Never would have guessed that. You seem to be part of a different trolling campaign than the one promoted by the article though.

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[siddesu]

They just came back to Europe a few hours ago, if you have not noticed. With a working bomb, too.

Genius!

[tlambert]

And whoever heard of an Islamic Militant holding a grudge?

how can I help?

[Charliemopps]

I'm all for this. But I don't speak Hebrew... that's what they speak right? Anyway, any English speaking Mohammedans that have a forum?

Re:how can I help?

[cubby96]

Predominant languages by country, according to their respective CIA factbooks:

Current 'enemies' or states with open conflicts and "terrorists" (judge that term at your own discretion):
Afghanis mostly speak a Persian dialect (50%) or Pashto (35%)
Iraqis speak Arabic (official language)
Iranians speak Persian (53%)

Current 'allies' or states with ties to the US, but who have produced militants intent on our destruction:
Saudis speak Arabic (100%)
Egyptians speak Arabic (official language)
Emiratis speak Arabic (official language)

Arabic is what you would really want to learn, if you were intent on doing this effectively. But, I would suggest that if you were willing to go that far, you could probably help more by working inside our intelligence community rather than trolling the 'enemy' and pissing them off even more.

Re:how can I help?

[shutdown -p now]

Anyway, any English speaking Mohammedans that have a forum?

Just go to YouTube and search for "jihad bil saif", then have fun in the comments.

Other useful search terms are country name + "mujahideen", where country name is one of: Afghanistan, Iraq, Chechnya (or, better yet Ichkeria, or Caucasus Emirate), Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo, Somalia - you can find more on Wikipedia. Also try "caliphate" and "ummah" with the same.

Re:how can I help?

[Charliemopps]

Be more help? Why would I want to help?

4chan

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone get 4chan on the line, I hear those guys have some EPIC trolls on their team.

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[JustOK]

It's not working anymore, is it?

Re:While I'm all for trolling Muslims

[russotto]

Never would have guessed that. You seem to be part of a different trolling campaign than the one promoted by the article though.

It's best to troll everywhere, just to make sure.

Re:Slashdot's reallyghone down hill....

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, I knew a guy named Jesus. He was from Nogales. Is he the same guy? He didn't seem all that friendly or helpful, but you never know...

Logic? Religion?

[lannocc]

Logic AND religious arguments? So which side are supposed to be the nut-jobs here?

you don't want them leaving you alone

[circletimessquare]

you want them furiously attacking you, with words. you, an anonymous troll on the internet

rather than bombing people in the real world

keep them occupied and wasting their time on the Internet by pointing the object of their rage at trollish subjects and ideas rather than real people and places

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[siddesu]

Apparently, it was a one-time device and not intended for repeated use.

Re:Slashdot's reallyghone down hill....

[Huge_UID]

Was that comment your application to Viral Peace? If so, I'd hire you.

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[Farmer Tim]

Extremists: taking planned obsolescence one step too far.

or we can sharpen occams razor

[nimbius]

and do the obvious thing: stop bombing random countries in the middle east every four to eight years. Anyone whos read Osama Bin Ladens demand list knows that most of his argument is structured around the fact that we bomb indiscriminately most of the middle east, topple their governments, kill their nationals and foreign nationals with drones, prop up malevolent dictators and generally leave the countries we've "touched" a complete wreck. trolling for peace will be nearly as effective as the like button was for Kony2012.

the state department understands quite well we need al quaeda in some form, hence a plan thats effectively designed to bolster recruitment. Without a boogeyman we have no pretext to assert regional dominance, and that would mean we would have to double down on our iran rhetoric and face whats largely believed to be a capable opponent in a war no one would support. Everything since the carter foreign policy doctrine has completely screwed this country into ensuring we pound the snot out of some unsuspecting foreign nation in the gulf once a presidency, its just that we're running out of little guys to fight that dont have big teeth, or allies that simply wont tolerate the action.

Re:or we can sharpen occams razor

[slimjim8094]

Yes and no. You're about half right. The thing about bin Laden was that he wanted us out of there so he could re-establish a caliphate and bring the region backwards about a thousand years. It wasn't all freedom and non-interference with him. Not saying that US intervention is always, or even often a good thing in that region, but bin Laden was dangerous to everybody, especially the Muslims in the area.

Re:While I'm all for trolling Muslims

[Anonymous Coward]

Your hate of Islam isn't racist, just bigoted and ignorant. I bet you've never met a Muslim in your life.

Your hate of rapist isn't racist, just bigoted and ignorant. I bet you've never met a rape victim in your life.

That is right, Islam is like a rapist and the muslim is the victim. Just because you can find a respectful and rational victim doesn't mean the rapist should go unpunished. Also, hating islam is not the same as hating the person that believe that sick cult(eg: the muslim). As it turn out, it is you that is bigoted and ignorant. Fuck off.

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[siddesu]

They screw the bolt until it breaks and then go back a quarter turn.

Not trolling, counter-trolling

[erice]

I think people reading too much into the description of the effort as "trolling".

Trolling on Usenet and sites like Slashdot is about provoking people who are otherwise engaged in reasoned, rational, discussions into flaming.

The Al Qaeda elements are presumably using weakly supported but not obviously wrong statements written to appeal to the emotions of would-be recruits and convince them that the irrational is reasonable. In other words, these elements are themselves trolling.

The counter would be to either reveal the trolls as nut jobs or provoke them to revealing that themselves. Posting fictitious but not obviously wrong arguments yourself is probably not the way to go about this.

Re:Not trolling, counter-trolling

[Black Parrot]

Trolling on Usenet and sites like Slashdot is about provoking people who are otherwise engaged in reasoned, rational, discussions into flaming.

Actually it's about pushing people's buttons, and it works best on people who take themselves waaay too seriously.

You troll people who are inclined to jerk their knees, not those who are inclined toward reasoned, rational discussions.

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[Farmer Tim]

What else do you expect from uptight nuts?

Re:Slashdot's reallyghone down hill....

[Black Parrot]

He said "more than ten". Might have been as many as... eleven.

Brainwashed

[Anonymous Coward]

The extremists are,.. well frankly fucking insane.
Have you seen them chanting allu ackbar over, and over, and over, and over (and over!) again in videos where they are in a battle of some sort? Setting off a remote IED or launching mortars or some such. This is not the behaviour of remotely rational people.

Same thing when the extremists are cutting the heads off people they've kidnapped, allu ackbar chanting chanting chanting endlessly. These people aren't exactly playing with a full deck.

Controversial opinion but I think it best we simply leave them alone and stay away. Let them do whatever they like in their country, don't interfere but also don't start importing them en masse to Western countries either.
(Causing problems in other countries, ) see:
https://www.google.com.au/search?q=islamification%20of%20france&hl=en&meta=

I don't want to hurt these people, I just don't want anything to do with these people.

improper internet meme usage

[circletimessquare]

proper internet meme usage:

Nut On, Apply Directly to the Nuts

Nut On, Apply Directly to the Nuts

Nut On, Apply Directly to the Nuts

without the theepeat, the meme is deficiently applied

trolling the trolls

[circletimessquare]

for epic lulz instead of epic tragedies

Re:The Muzzies are coming!

[siddesu]

Nothing good at all. The Swiss and their nutty Muesli serials should be banned forever.

I would love to do that!

[FudRucker]

trolling terrorists to disrupt their operations could be so much fun, it would be like the Three Stooges bopping them on the noggins

Re:Slashdot's reallyghone down hill....

[formfeed]

That's nothing compared to the experience I had with MyCleanPC.

- which was designed by either the US or Israel to destroy Iranian centrifuges.

Poe's Law

[Thyrsus]

Trolling will just be mistaken for another enemy sect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe's_law

Re:Trolling IS Combat, But Combat Doe Not Make Pea

[shutdown -p now]

pull back to a little bit tolerant

Tolerant of what, exactly?

You might note that they don't suggest to troll Muslims in general, just al Qaeda and other jihadists. Are you suggesting that we should be tolerant of their ideology of violent spread of their religion?

Your tax dollars at work people....

[multicoregeneral]

You know, it strikes me that it's odd that these idiots have nothing better to do. Why not just post youtube videos talking about how they wear womens underwear on their heads? It would be infinitely more entertaining.

Maybe poking bee's nests

[Eightbitgnosis]

isn't the best way to prevent getting stung in the future

Anyone who posts will be a terrorist suspect

[Saphati]

These sites are monitored by many governments. If you start posting to one of them, you will go onto a watch list as a terrorist suspect. Then, when you fly to another country or back to the USA, you will be seriously questioned. "Because the government told me so." will not work. I would not do it. Never trust any government.

Great idea!

[Alex Belits]

I am all for anything that promotes the idea that any kind of political speech coming from US is poisonous propaganda, and should not be trusted.

Think of it as a weakened vaccine against more sophisticated forms of US propaganda.

Re:Slashfuck bitches are too limp to do this

[cornjones]

well trolled, but I think the thrust of the article was to troll the _other_ way...

Awesome, Diplomatic Immunity for "First Post!"

[Brewster Jennings]

I'm a little disappointed in the State Department hasn't figured out that arguing on the internet is like playing Global Thermonuclear War in "War Games", the only way to win is not to play. That being said, I'm arguing my point on the internet, so I might as well submit myself for an Irony award this year.

Re:Mujahadeen protect Al Quaeda

[stdarg]

I don't think you know much about the Koran.

That's it

[CAIMLAS]

That's it, let's pit one group of amoral and antagonistic extremist virgins against another. Let's see what happens!

Or:
We've replaced the hardcore soldiers in this scenario with ineffectual internet nerds. Let's see if they notice.

I see the new military slogan now:

[DiEx-15]

Defeat Terrorists... One Troll At A Time!

Jesus 'n' Mo

[RockDoctor]

Because a caustic application of wit .... will get you dead.