What's wrong with the word 'militant'?

Posted By Blake Hounshell Wednesday, December 3, 2008 - 9:50 AM Share

Tom Gross, a former Middle East correspondent for Britain's Sunday Telegraph, moots a drearily familiar argument in the Wall Street Journal:

What is the motivation of journalists in trying to mangle language -- such as going out of their way to refer to terrorists as "militants," as one Mumbai story on yesterday's Times of London Web site seemed to do? Do they somehow wish to express sympathy for these murderers, or perhaps make their crimes seem almost acceptable? How are we going to effectively confront terrorists when we can't even identify them as such?

Elsewhere in the piece, Gross does manage to cite some egregious examples of media figures seeming to go out of their way to avoid using the word "terrorist," but I must confess that I simply do not understand the obsession some press critics have with the word "militant."

It's a perfectly accurate description of people who shoot innocent civilians, and it can also be applied to people who attack police officials and soldiers. It can accurately describe leaders of terrorist groups who may not be personally involved in conducting attacks, but are nonetheless "militant." I don't see the word having any positive connotations whatsoever. Do you?

EXPLORE:MEDIA, TERRORISM
 

VOTE4YOSSARIAN

10:49 AM ET

December 3, 2008

They had guns and killed

They had guns and killed people...we can call them "donkeys" or "roller coasters" for all I care. It matters what they did, not what they are referred to as.

 

BRIAN D

11:13 AM ET

December 3, 2008

Because some people admire militants

Militants can end up on t-shirts, or on a flag in a presidential campaign office. They can raise money in Irish bars in America. They can stand outside a polling place in Philadelphia and the reaction from many people is, "So what?"

Nobody thinks that way about a "terrorist." "Militant" describes a much wider range of behavior. Malcolm X is often described as militant. Some considered John Carlos's and Tommie Smith's black power salute on the gold medal podium to be a militant gesture. The band Rage Against the Machine was often described as having militant political views, and they sold millions of albums.

Nobody would ever confuse those examples with terrorists. "Terrorist" is a much less ambiguous word and it is the one that should be used.

 

BLAKE HOUNSHELL

11:32 AM ET

December 3, 2008

some people admire terrorists, too

To wit: "Despite American efforts, or perhaps because of them, Osama bin Laden is a hero to many people in the Middle East and South Asia. Bazaars and marketplaces are full with bin Laden merchandise including posters, video and audio tapes, and T-shirts." Link. I don't think it has anything to do with the words used to describe these guys.
 

TREVOSHEA

1:21 PM ET

December 3, 2008

"Terrorist" is the political

"Terrorist" is the political equivalent of "enemy". Words like "insurgent" or "militant" require the reader/viewer to actually think, whereas "terrorist" does the thinking for them. Calling Hamas a "terrorist" group can blind one to the legitimate reasons behind their existence, specifically an illegal occupation, as most will immediately connect "terrorist" with "spawn of satanic evil".

Morality, generally speaking, is not something we should be worrying about in news articles. Hence my preference for "militant". American soldiers cause terrorism all the time, but we refer to them as "soldiers", although they are often technically terrorists according to the dictionary. Anybody remember World War II? Who wasn't a terrorist in that war? But historians do not talk about "terrorist bombings of Dresden", or "terrorist bombings of Japan"? Hiroshima was 100% terrorism, by the definition. Is the United States a terrorist organization? See how easy it is to just throw these words around? You might as well refer to the Mumbai situation as having been carried out by "bad dudes".

The less we use "terrorist", the less it will be misused. Better to use our own minds to determine morality, rather than someone else's simplistic labels.

 

KALEBERG

4:07 PM ET

December 3, 2008

Let's see what the dictionary

Let's see what the dictionary on my computer says:

"combative or aggressive in support of a political or social cause, and typically favoring extreme, violent, or confrontational methods"

Yeah, I remember hearing Martin Luther King's movement called militant as they favored confrontation, often violent. Granted, they usually weren't the violent party, but they knew that by being militant they would bring their cause to the conscience of the nation.

A terrorist is a militant who favors extreme, violent methods with the purpose of instilling fear and terror.

I have no idea of why the press is favoring the word militant lately. They probably don't know how to use the dictionaries on their computers. Let's face it, we are talking about the press. I'm often amazed how well they can cut and paste press releases.

 

GITANJALI

6:23 AM ET

December 9, 2008

"militant" has regional connotations

I don't think that the word militant has positive connotations.
I do think however that people find the terminology used dicomforting for two main reasons.

1. "Militant" usually refers to a struggle on a regional level. Whereas the term 'terrorist' after 9/11 has taken on a more global persona. I think some people construed the excessive use of the word militant as an attempt by certain media to underplay the significance of the event.

2. let's face it - militant is a more neutral word. The formal definitions are self explanatory.
militant - a person engaged in warfare or combat.
terrorist - a person who terrorizes or frightens others.

3. If it really wasn't such an issue then why do they seem to go out of their way to avoid the term terrorist?

 

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