CULTURE & SOCIETY
CULTURE & SOCIETY
Domestic Terrorism in the United States: A History RACHEL HOPKINSON
In 2001, the United States of America was victim to the largest terrorist attack in recorded history, with the tragedy of 9/11 having long-lasting, profound impacts both at home and across the world. However, the threat of terrorism in the US does not solely stem from foreign militant forces such as Al-Qaeda or Isis; in fact, some of the largest terrorist threats the US have faced have been born on US soil. Domestic terrorism is a growing threat in our current affairs, as reflected by “the years 2020 and 2021 [having] the highest numbers of domestic terrorist attacks and plots” in the data of the Centre for Strategic International Studies. This new spike in the domestic threat has triggered the first ever “National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism” being published by President Biden. It is apparent that this presents a significant issue for the United States, so what is the history of this threat that seems to have
permeated American society and how has it developed into the widescale issue it is today? The latter half of nineteenth century America saw nine significant domestic terrorist attacks including six massacres. Despite the staggering number of attacks, the political ideologies that motivated each event vastly fluctuated with every act of violence. The San Francisco Coal Miners Massacre in 1849 was driven by a white vigilante group named “the Hounds” whereas the following attack, the Pottawatomi Creek massacre of 1856, was led by Abolitionist Jonh Brown against pro-slavery settlers. Two such differing motivations in succession of each other suggests the instability of American society at this time, widely driven by the 13th amendment to the US constitution that abolished slavery, creating extremists on ends of the political spectrum.
Overall, the ideology implies justice is served to victims of sexual harassment or abuse through the perpetrators being served criminal charges. Ultimately, it was presented as the greatest liberation tool that feminists could use to work towards gender equality. However, in reality it lacks nuance as it draws a direct path from crime to punishment as serving justice to the victim. Yet, the complexities in which justice can be served are mostly ignored by this theory. Therefore, although carceral feminism led to key legal changes which helped to create equality, the damaging secondary impacts of this school of thought should not be ignored if feminism today still aims to achieve equality for all men and women.
Through the generalisations of both men and woman, legal action was seen as the best solution to domestic violence. Although this school of thought has obvious flaws, the movement certainly accelerated the introduction of tighter laws around equality. In the UK, the Sex Discrimination Act in 1975 made it “unlawful to treat a woman ‘less favourably’ than a man ‘on the ground of her sex.’” Furthermore, in 1974, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act allowed women to open their own bank accounts. These crucial legal advances almost certainly wouldn’t have been passed as soon or as successfully as they were without the influence of the carceral feminism movement.
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