Thread by @hereliesakiel

Seriously the very fact that we have to argue that the BBS wouldn't have protected us is proof of how rapidly the conversation has deteriorated

They attacked churches for years. They had no interest in protecting them.

Context matters, people. What were their aims of warning about terror? Who were they aimed at? What was their plan of action?

Their ultimate goal was suppressing Muslims, and also Christians, and also Tamils.

Muslims were hyper visible in Sri Lanka at the time of BBS, so attacks against them were widely publicised. Tamils were also a target, but after the war ended the major source of anti-Tamil sentiment had been diminished.

But Christian churches were attacked year after year with barely anyone taking notice and hardly any action taken to prevent it. And it especially grinds my gears that this is forgotten in the aftermath of the ISIS attack: that we as a country made Christians an easy target.

So in the wake of that... How insulting is it to say the churches could've been saved if we'd taken people who wanted to destroy churches more seriously?

These things work in cycles. A destabilised middle east produced terrorists whose attacks led to wars that further destabilised the middle east and led to even more terrorists.

Terrorist attacks amplify Islamaphobia and terrorists exploit the divide to make more people terrorists which further fuels Islamaphobia...

BBS just jumped into that cycle and gave it a hand. They definitely contributed to ISIS propaganda. They made Daesh's job easier for them.

And knowing their aims, you think they're sad about this attack? They hate Christians, and Christians got attacked. More people hate Muslims as a result. This is a win-win for them.

You think they'd have done anything to prevent this?

I wish we weren't even talking about BBS now. I wish, in a time when anti-Muslim sentiment is rising, people weren't bringing BBS up for the WORST possible reason.

Muslim women literally just describing being harassed and saying not to blame their harassers get accused of creating disharmony. So what does that make bringing up a hate group like they were onto something?

And it's not like there's a lack of groups we could've listened to. Apparently there was no shortage of intelligence on the terrorist threat. What was in short supply was people who'd listen to them.

If there was literally no one else to warn us I'd make some room for people saying BBS had info that could've saved us. But lots of people were warning us.

So if you single out, out of all the sources we should've taken seriously, the ones who were already making Sri Lanka dangerous?

Either you're clueless, racist, or both. And you're not making anyone safer.