Manufactured external terror serves elite interests while real internal terror afflicts the poor.

Evidence

In 2009, the State Department reported that the number of Americans killed that year around the world due to terrorism was a grand total of nine. Fourteen people were injured, and four were kidnapped. To put those numbers in perspective, the Bureau of Labor Statistics counted 4,340 deaths due to workplace events or exposure in 2009.14 Deaths from car accidents numbered 30,797.15 Yet no one declared war on corporations or auto manufacturers. What’s more, a State Department terrorism report released in April 2009 states that “al-Qaeda … and associated networks continued to lose ground, both structurally and in the court of world public opinion.” Nevertheless, the report asserted that these organizations “remained the greatest terrorist threat to the United States and its partners.” All this reveals not only the disconnect between rhetoric and reality but also the mechanics involved in mobilizing a politics of fear. It is worth emphasizing that the threat from terrorism is a manufactured crisis, one that is useful to justify war and continued violations of civil liberties domestically. The green scare is just as useful today as the red scare was during the Cold War. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 508 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Seen in perspective, the domestic War on Terror is not really about keeping Americans safe as much as it is about creating a spectacle of fear. During the Cold War, schools routinely conducted “duck and cover” drills in which students and teachers hid under tables, supposedly to protect them from a blast in the event of a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. Whatever the marginal benefits of ducking under a table, the ability to survive a nuclear bomb depends on one’s distance from the blast, not on the furniture. The real goal of such activities was to keep the threat of attack alive and to foster fear and paranoia. In the War on Terror era, color-coded “terror threat levels” (ultimately phased out in 2011) and “if you see something, say something” signs in airports and subway stations have served a similar purpose by generating the spectacle of terrorism. And mainstream media coverage of “foiled terror plots” orchestrated by the law enforcement community only serves to reinforce this atmosphere. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 484 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim
• XREF: connects to: War against terrorism is itself a form of terrorism.; Domestic war on terror functions as a manufactured spectacle of fear rather than safety — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 484; The terrorism threat is a manufactured crisis useful for justifying war and curtailing liberties. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 508 (+3 more)

Related

• War against terrorism is itself a form of terrorism. (similarity 0.92)
• Manufactured terrorist threats serve governance by keeping citizens fearful and quiescent (similarity 0.90)
• The terrorism threat is a manufactured crisis useful for justifying war and curtailing liberties. (similarity 0.90)
• Domestic war on terror functions as a manufactured spectacle of fear rather than safety (similarity 0.85)
• Terrorism fear uniquely suits political manipulation because it resists quick fixes (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• The terrorism threat is a manufactured crisis useful for justifying war and curtailing liberties. #corroborates (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 508
• Domestic war on terror functions as a manufactured spectacle of fear rather than safety #corroborates (0.75) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 484
• Manufactured terrorist threats serve governance by keeping citizens fearful and quiescent #corroborates (0.70)
• A government can manufacture crisis to construct its own people as enemy #corroborates (0.65) — , The Braided Reading EPUB, 111
• War against terrorism is itself a form of terrorism. #expands (0.60)