As with the Hamas attack on October 7th and Al Qaeda's on 9/11, as with John Brown's murder or slave owners on the eve of the US civil war, as with the Indian independence movement outside of Gandhi, as with suffragette terror bombings in the early 20th century, as with unionist terror bombings in Europe in the 19th century, it's important to put terrorism in the context of the times.
Terrorism is bad, but it usually only exists in the context of far greater evils. Genocide, imperialism, colonialism, slavery, child labor, systeming oppression of women, and yes, climate change.
Of all of these, climate change will be the most deadly (though colonialism probably still has it beat for genocide). Entire nations are already being wiped off the map, and dozens more will follow. Hundreds of millions will die violently, with the people of Berlin as a group killing thousands of them though their present-day emissions.
In that context, focusing on condemning a couple of radicals who didn't even kill anyone is denying the gravity of the situation.
Every terrorist group was condemned at the time of the events. Many are now considered good in the eyes of history, and most of those have had their actions whitewashed by educational institutes dedicated to the status quo, or have had their results attributed to their pacifist compatriots.
I'm not saying anyone should engage in violence. There are plenty of people who need no encouragement if only you stop condemning and sanctioning them. Diversity of tactics has historically almost always been more effective than pacifism. So let us do our best in the way we like and let them do their best in the way they like.
And before anyone cites Chenoweth at me, read their paper and their later comments about how the paper is being misused to argue for pacifism. Then if you're surprised, maybe add Gelderloos' The Failure of Nonviolence to your reading list.
