This morning, as I was going through your answers to check that you have a correct understanding of your chosen question and the right sort of ideas for an answer, I remembered that I'd recently read a few stories on cyberterrorism, which I thought might be useful for anyone who had chosen to answer question 10.
In "£7.5m university fund to train cybersecurity experts", Sean Coughlan reports that major British universities have been recruited to provide special training in cybersecurity in response to increasing threats from cyber-attacks, which the government rates as being as serious as terrorism, whether by states or individuals (2013).
Like Poom (Nattida), I am thinking of writing an essay on the interesting question of which group of protesters, if either, have committed acts of terrorism in Thailand's recent political history. I've already written essays on a few of the questions, as you might guess from the summary of an argument I give supporting my thesis that Buddhists today should not normally eat meat in order to properly follow their first precept. I've also answered the question about Bush's first election as US president, although I have to admit that I've since changed my mind considerably: I still think that although he was a rotten president, his election was democratic, but I now have very different reasons for thinking this. I have written the essay supporting my ideas about Abhisit's government, but for the same reasons that support that the awful Bush's election was democratic, Abhisit's government was not democratic.
Although, I guess like Poom, I have some ideas about whether the Reds or the Yellows committed terrorism, I'm not yet so confident of my ideas as to assert them without some weakening introductory language: I think both might have committed acts of terrorism, but in my opinion, the Yellow PAD mob are definitely guilty of committing acts of terrorism. I don't know if Poom, and others, agree with this or not, and I'm not yet 100% certain that I can support it - I might change my mind over the next few days as I work on the support. So, what do you think? Are the Yellows the real terrorists, or the Reds, or both equally?
Naturally, those phrases I think and in my opinion will not be there when I come to write my thesis statement. By then I will have done the thinking and research to support a strong, confident statement.
If you would also like to blog an article that is relevant to your chosen essay question, feel welcome. It might be a useful way to try out ideas and get some very constructive feedback.
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References
Peter F AUA. (2013a, May 1). The Popes: lying and killing as ever. Class Blog - AEP at AUA. Retrieved May 14, 2013 from http://peteraep.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-popes-lying-and-killing-as-ever.html
Peter F AUA. (2013b, May 3). Is your (future) job safe from technology? Class Blog - AEP at AUA. Retrieved May 14, 2013 from http://peteraep.blogspot.com/2013/05/is-your-job-safe-from-technology.html
Peter F AUA. (2013c, May 6). Meaty Matters. Class Blog - AEP at AUA. Retrieved May 14, 2013 from http://peteraep.blogspot.com/2013/05/meaty-matters.html
I think that not all of both Red and Yellow are terrorists but I'm definitely sure that some of them are, particularly their mainstays. And again, most of Thai presses are awful. I don't know which one I can rely on when I want to find out the truth. Question 10 is probably the hardest for me. I'm afraid that I would just follow my gut with no preferably strong proofs on both sides if I choose this topic.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Sorn.
DeleteAs I wrote the questions, I put in what I thought was roughly the order of difficulty, and I definitely think that number 10 is the most challenging.
As I mentioned in my post, I've changed my mind a lot about my reasons for saying that, much as I think he was a rotten president, Bush's first election was democratic, although a lot of Americans disagree with me. But at least there I have haven't changed my mind about what I think, just the supporting reasons.
In the case of the terrorism question, I'm not even sure what my own mind will end up settling on as I do the thinking necessary to sort out and clarify my own ideas. I added the I think and in my opinion in italics to emphasise my own uncertainty about the provisional and very tentative opinions I was expressing.
But I do think it's an interesting question, with the definition part of the essay having implications well beyond the Yellow v. Red question.