Domestic Terrorism Essay -- Violent Crime National Terror Essays

Domestic Terrorism National terrorism has been the focus of attention since September 11. But now domestic terrorism is becoming increasingly common among hate groups across the nation. Domestic terrorism can be defined as visible crime, or â€Å"street crime.† These acts would consist of violent crimes, (acts against people in which injury or death results) property crimes (acts that threaten property held by individuals or the state) and public order crimes. (acts that threaten the general well-being of society and challenger accepted moral principles) It can also however be described as political crime, (criminal acts by or against the government for ideological purposes) which would include the 9/11 and the Oklahoma City bombing.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  This article directly relates to the definition of sociology, which is the systematic study of social behavior and human groups. This news item is sociological because it focuses on terrorism which is an act of violence (social/deviant behavior) against a person, group, or an entire nation (human groups). This article focuses on the behavior of domestic terrorist groups or gangs of people such as â€Å"the white supremacists, anti government types, militia members, eco-terrorists and people that hate corporations.† [1] â€Å"They include violent anti-abortionists and black and brown nationalists who envision a separate state for blacks and Latinos.† [1] Throughout this article I will use domestic terrorist groups as the name for the groups listed above. (hate groups, etc.) Many sociological concepts can be applied to this news article; however there are four specific ones which I feel are the best, which are social structure, roles, deviance and social control. Every society has a social structure, which is the way in which a society is organized into predictable/patterned relationships. This relates directly to the human groups, i.e. white supremacists etc. discussed in the news article. When you belong to such a group you stand for something, and the people that occupy the group consider it their own society in which they make their own rules and regulations. They take on different roles which are deviant to our society but acceptable to theirs. In the case of this article these groups all plan and/or commit violent acts against people or other groups because they believe it’s acceptable, which according to us would be orga... ... a mailing list. This would include each organization being sent a packet including the survey (however formatted), and a letter requesting their participation. Then, over a period of time monitor which organizations respond and which do not. Of the ones that don’t respond, a letter of reminder or even another packet could be sent back to the organization. After that, another letter could be sent but it should probably stop at that point, as the organizations probably don’t want to respond. In conclusion domestic terrorism is recognized by all law enforcement agencies as a â€Å"problem.† They all agree that this issue needs to be deeply looked at and that efforts to counter domestic terrorism must develop quickly. Although, in the article â€Å"police say the number of people arrested for plotting domestic terrorist acts is greater than the number of people arrested for actually carrying out the terrorist acts,†[1] there is still lots of work to be done on the issue. There should be an equal amount of focus on national and domestic terrorism in our country. References: [1] Copeland, Larry. â€Å"Domestic Terrorism: New trouble at home.†   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  USA TODAY 15 Nov. 2004, natl. ed. : 1A – 2A