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Quote by Richard A. Falk

“I do think there is an enhanced awareness of insecurity and vulnerability that induces anxiety that creates pressure on teachers and administrators to offer simplistic explanations and to be resistant to expressions of attitudes that can be viewed as unpatriotic, which is further interpreted as applicable to any tendency to challenge the government when it claims to be acting overseas to avoid repetitions of 9/11 or to encroach on domestic freedom to identify suspicious persons and behaviors.”

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Richard A. Falk

Richard A. Falk is a renowned international law scholar, born on November 13, 1930. He has extensive research and teaching experience in the fields of international law and international relations. more

“Doing something, however pathetic, is psychologically better than doing nothing. In the current political environment - that is, with no more Cold War tensions - the tendency is to counteract the feelings of fear and vulnerability with a variety of military, paramilitary and police measures, despite the reality that this kind of excessive reliance on force in many ways intensifies the very problem it is purporting to solve.”

“Our [American] leaders are so socialized as to address militarized threats by acting on the basis of a militarized mentality that the deep roots of problems are ignored.”

Problem Acting Leader Roots Bases Threat Addresses Mentality Ignored Deep Roots

Author:Richard A. Falk

“Looking more deeply at the emergence of ISIS or the chaos that exists in Syria, Yemen and Libya would clearly raise crucial doubts about reliance on military intervention and drone warfare as adequate counterterrorist responses and would call attention to the detrimental effects of US "special relationships" with Israel and Saudi Arabia.”

“So far, the official definitions of terrorism have the role of demonizing the enemies of the United States and Israel, and of sanitizing recourse to indiscriminate force by both governments that causes widespread death of innocent civilians. This double standard is built around the current way in which the vocabulary of terrorism is being used in this country.”

“There is no effort to acknowledge some equivalent accountability by associating "terrorism" with all violence that is deliberately aimed at civilians, either directly or as foreseeable effects of violent acts, whether the actor is a non-state individual or group or the state.”

States Actors Individual Effort Violence Groups Effects Terrorism Violent Acknowledge Accountability Civilians Violent Acts

Author:Richard A. Falk

“Looked at objectively, it is clear that the overwhelming majority of civilian deaths resulting from political violence are produced by what should be understood as "state terror." Terrorism also serves as an excuse to avoid diplomacy and the peaceful resolution of conflict.”

Quote by Richard A. Falk

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