CNN.com – Education chief’s ‘terrorist’ remark ignites fury – Feb. 24, 2004
Education Secretary Rod Paige’s most newsworthy action so far (who knew this Administration even had an Education Secretary?) was to embarrass himself by declaring that the National Education Association, the union for 2.7 million school teachers, was a terrorist organization. While I’m glad he apologized for his ridiculous statement, it’s a worrisome sign that calling someone a “terrorist” has become the 21st century version of calling someone a “Nazi”.
Mike Godwin developed the following adage around 1990:
As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.
It appears that American culture after September 2001 requires an update to this law:
As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving terrorists approaches one.
Mr. Paige’s gaffe is evidence that the law may apply equally well to offline discussion.
My personal experience has been that the Nazi comparison is made about equally often by members of the political left and the right (and the middle), but perhaps a bit more by the left against the right. Your mileage may vary. The terrorist label, however, seems to be most commonly applied from right to left.
In my observation, terror is used just as often as a weapon by conservative factions as by liberal ones. Furthermore, wouldn’t you say the Nazis were terrorists? Maybe we are just broadening our brush with the shiny new terrorist pejorative to include even more people we don’t like.
As in the comparison to Nazis, people seem quick to call someone a terrorist if that person is doing something they don’t like. The terrorist label seems to be more frequently applied by the ruling power to whomever is challenging current government policy. Perhaps the current trend of right to left usage is just because conservatives are currently in power in the US.
Maybe the direction of terrorist-calling versus Nazi-calling really is about who has more power, rather than any political ideology. The Nazis were a governing party that used terror and despicable tactics to get what they wanted without regard to loss of human life. Terrorists are generally thought of (unless you are Rod Paige) as underground revolutionaries who use terror and despicable tactics to get what they want without regard to loss of human life.
If you’re not in power, call your enemies who are in power Nazis. If you are in power, call your enemies who aren’t in power terrorists. Life really is simple when we can break it down to such easy to remember rules.