317 posts of pure, unadulterated hate and counting. I need to step away from this thread. It's gotten pretty ugly...

You're going to have to explain to me again how DDOS against credit card processors is directly endangering lives. Remember, we're talking about what really happened, not whatever made up fantasy you can come up with.
You know, taking hostages usually implies a willingness to kill the hostages. Taking a bunch of computers (with an awesome backup system) "hostage" again, isn't the same thing.

So if nobody gets hurt, it is okay?

So if someone waved a gun in your face and threatened to kill you (but didn't take your money or pull the trigger), you wouldn't mind? Oh wait, of course YOU wouldn't. You are hardcore :p

But fine, let's list things that people might use their credit cards to pay for:
Insulin: An irresponsible diabetic might not keep a stash in reserve for the occasion where they can't buy more
Gas: Run out of gas, late for an interview. Pay for a taxi? Oh noes, I don't have money in my wallet and want to use my debit card at the ATM :p
Parking: Pretty much same scenario as gas. People who pay for parking in lots tend to not carry coins for meters.

I have said again and again, I'm not judging the morality. It's not terrorism man, plain and simple.

Yes, cause you totally will die of insulin shock, no pharmacy would ever dole out meds without cash payment up front to someone in insulin shock and certainly no bystander would pay a couple of bucks to save someone's life. What kind of world do you live in?

Seriously, you cannot make the case that anymore lives were threatened than when Obama takes a crap. Go ahead, find me the mounds of dead bodies.

Again, I will restate, it's not terrorism. I'm not judging the morality, merely stating it was effective and that the attacked target was the target of their ire.

You have to spread the definition pretty thin to encapsulate 'financial violence.' But if you still insist that interrupting financial transactions is a form of terrorism, I won't lose any sleep knowing that you consider Visa, MasterCard and PayPal terrorist organizations for interrupting Wikileaks' financial transactions. If I do happen to lose sleep, however, I will simply consider that a form of 'sleep violence,' you terrorist!

I was listening to CBC Radio One here and they were discussing the possibility of extraditing Assange to Sweden where he will spend the rest of his life in a labor camp (I'm sorry, I'm being told I'm mixing Sweden up with China), and that if the US attempts to have the UK extradite Assange to the US they have to promise not to give him the death penalty (according to British law, British authorities cannot extradite people to places if the government does not guarantee the death penalty will not be handed down) for "terrorism." I think this raises an important issue - namely, if the UK decides to wash their hands of Assange and send him to Sweden over criminal charges of questionable veracity or the US over possible charges of "terrorism" and what that means about free speech.

So someone mugging you (through the "Give me all you got, I want your money not your life but if you try to make a move I won't think twice" method, as opposed to the smash and grab) is not violence in your eyes?
The police (or evil spy agency!) freezing your assets isn't an exertion of force or power?
Someone menacingly holding a lighter and a can of gasoline in your mom and pop store isn't an exertion of power against your rights and laws?

None of those involve any physical action (and are all pretty on par with what Anon did to the credit card companies).

I thought we had an agreement about ridiculous comparisons. If you must think of it in terms of real threats and real violence then it is more like a couple of kids pulling each other's hair; saying "I'll let go if you let go." And then they both let go.

The credit card companies halt Wikileaks' financial transactions. Anonymous halts the credit card companies' financial transactions and says "I'll let go if you let go." And then they both let go.

If you insist on over-trivializing things to avoid any potential for the realization that this is an actual act of terrorism, fine, we'll go with your metaphor.

This is like a kid (Wikileaks) complaining because his mommy (Credit Card Companies) won't buy him a toy. So said kid's brother (Pedos Anonymous) starts throwing a huge tantrum. Full-blown throwing crap around the room, crying, screaming, etc. You know, all the crap that makes those well-intentioned (but nosy) people start thinking "child abuse".

So that leaves the mom (calling a credit card "mommy" is just creepy. See what you made me do? :p) have to decide: Deal with the tantrum and allow everyone in the store to be bothered, look horrible, and potentially have to explain to the police that your kid is really just that stupid. Or give in and buy the dumbass's brother a toy.

The kid who likes pictures of infants (only way the pedophilia angle will still work with the kid metaphor) is applying "the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes". Err. Wikileaks-kid wanted a Kung-Fu Grip Obama. Yeah, that will work :p

Oh noes, what is that dictionary.com? That is the definition of terrorism? Really?
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/terrorism?r=75&src=ref&ch=dic

Oh snap!

&ch Back to pedophile jokes, I see. If that's really as clever as it's going to get, I might as well exit the discussion now.

Works for me. I made the point I wanted to (it is a dictonary-definition of terrorism).

Good discussion.

Alright, staying only with the ones involved then, shall we?
On one side we have Wikileaks who are getting their accounts frozen / suspended, which apparently is absolutely ok since they are criminals (which is an opinion, not a fact - they haven't been put in court and afaik no lawsuit is pending or even put up).
On the other side we have hacking attacks (criminal) against those companies, which also affects their customers accounts and therefor is terrorism.

I'd say the irony is almost Monty Pythonesque. Almost.

Yep, me too. I find it even more hard to identify if a government does it, claiming "we're the good guys".

Any business has the right to refuse service. Simple as that.

Which once again makes me ask: Do two wrongs make a right?

Technically untrue. It may be illegal to refuse service in a large number of cases, especially businesses that are considered "open to the public". I'm not saying this applies in the Visa/Mastercard case, they probably had every right to refuse service under current law.

Fair enough, although I think that is more just a matter of "You can legally refuse service, but you can't discriminate". You know, THAT whole mess :p

And according to Wiki, the rationale used by most of the companies that denied service have to do with not facilitating illegal activities.
If I recall correctly, the guy who leaked the details on afghanistan/iraq got arrested. So there is your precedent for illegal activities, and Wikileaks is all about encouraging people to do stuff like that.