NEUROMANCER and Terrorism [View all]
There's a discussion of terrorism in Neuromancer (1984) that is thrillingly ahead of its time. Essentially that the media co-opted terrorism so that the terrorist was in dialog with the media, not with the ostensible target.
Is one trying to kill 10,000 people or trying to get the news coverage that 10,000 people were killed?
Pretty obvious to us today, but not bad for 1984.
Oddly enough, the reason Americans back then were surprisingly savvy about terrorism was because of the Patty Hearst kidnapping more than suicide bombers in Israel or planes hijacked to Cuba. The SLA knew they were essentially producing a TV show on the nightly news. It was all about a narrative on the nightly news, not about a real-world blow like toppling the Pentagon. (Hence Paddy Chayefsky's business arrangement between terrorists and the TV news in NETWORK.)
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