What exactly are the attacks in Norway about?

I’m curious too. The last news of it was the authorities had a suspect in custody and that’s all.

It is probably too soon to know the real story on the cause behind Anders Behring Breivik’s reason for causing so many deaths. So far, it just seems like speculation. Here is one article that may shed some light, but again, it is speculation.

I read an article which says that the police don’t know yet (and/or haven’t made a statement yet about motive), but that they think the suspect may be willing to explain his reasons. It sounds like there will probably be a statement after the police have finished interviewing him.

Sounds like it basically he was a Norwegian “extreme right-wing” type who was hostile towards foreigners in Norway, and didn’t like the current Prime Minister’s political party, which ran the camp he attacked.

The Norwegians have not yet ascertained a motive.

I think it is safe to say that he was insane.

He was a christian activist bearing a grievance against the ruling labour party.
Highly unusual that a killer of this nature survives, he’s apparently co-operating with Norwegian police. Seems for once the truth will come out of the horses mouth as it were.

From a friend in Oslo on Facebook

Shooter was caught after the shooting spree that claimed over a staggering 80 young lives. The bomb looks almost like a diversion now, to tie up the emergency services. The perpetrators name and picture has been made public. His political agenda is actually anti-immigration and anti-Islam, his grudge against the government liberal immigration policy appears to be the main motive.

Sounds like someone trapped inside his own head for too long.

I read that he said that it was awful, but necessary and he would explain it all in court on Monday. Tune in.

Something just doesn’t set right with this whole situation. The photos of the gunman looked like he had taken them at “Olan Mills” to include in his Christmas card. Even when “the truth” comes out…I doubt we will know the full story. We rarely do.

I absolutely felt heartsick for the Norwegians who lost their lives…it was senseless. Norway has failed to adopt the Euro and they did the right thing. The Euro is now tanking and Norway is out of the economic mess that is ruining Greece and soon Italy.

(Stay strong Norway and stay as economically independent as possible!)

According to this New York Times article, his manifesto and documentations portray him as the right-wing Christian version of al-Qaeda. He used terrorism to attack the representatives of what he saw as almost cosmic ideological enemies, in this case the multiculuralist, Muslim-coddling Labor party.

It’s also possible that he worked with a network of like-minded individuals.

As I said….we won’t ever know the truth. Now, anyone who dares to speak out will be put in the same league with this crazy man.

Perfect.

That a tragedy like this was implemented….is heinous. Absolutely heinous.

Stay strong, Norway… no matter what. A small, proud country like you…deserves to continue to live in as much freedom as possible. And that means…no Euro.

I doubt that we’ll ever know for sure, as @DarlingRhadamanthus has said, and even if we know “what was in his mind”, it’ll be incoherent and meaningless to anyone with an ounce of rationality.

The fact that he was an “extreme rightist” is just another meaningless detail, I think. If he’d been a Social Democrat, how would that have played, I wonder? Would they say “an extreme centrist” went on a rampage? No, because that would also be meaningless, but “extreme rightist” makes it sound like “he’s not one of our kind”, so that must sort of explain things to some.

Meaningless. It’s all meaningless and insane.

Immigration and Islam, I gathered. Doubtless coupled with a desperation fueled by the sensation that he was being ignored by his government.

@CWOTUS

It’s not meaningless. People want to know why he did it; they want to know what his political motivation was. Saying that his political leaning is “meaningless” completely undermines why his targets were what they were. Also, I think one of the main reasons he is continuously referred to that way (despite the fact that he is) is that many assumed the attacks were perpetrated by Muslims, so it’s merely clearing it up.

There wasn’t really a motive.
At least 90 people died because of this man. He only wanted attention.
It’s sad that these poor souls were stolen of their lives over a sick man’s obsession. :(

From my understanding, the guy was worried about the threat to Norway from “multiculturalism and Islam.” So he attacked a government building, and a kid’s camp held by a political party. Methinks Norway should be more worried about the threat from wingnuts like this guy.

@DarlingRhadamanthus, I strongly disagree. We may not know exactly what happened in this person’s mind—the same can be said about anyone. But terrorist ideology is not some inscrutable black box. In fact, I think we have a responsibility to try to find out what makes these people tick. That’s exactly what we do with al-Qaeda. It’s what we have done with school shooters. And it’s what we should be doing with this guy. If nothing else, trying to understand him would help identify others like him.

And as @DominicX said, obviously his intent was not “meaningless,” the man wrote a manifesto for God’s sake. Deranged and sociopathic, but there is content to analyze.

I also mentioned this in the other thread. Breivik was in touch with right-wing bloggers and he seems to be a co-author of

http://www.scribd.com/doc/60739170/2083-a-European-Declaration-of-Independence

which might be seen as a modern and somewhat lighter version of “Mein Kampf”. The scapegoat role gets assigned to Muslims instead of Jews. He was inspired by various non-militant ultraconservative movements in Europe and also the Tea Party. However, over time he had become frustrated because these movements were not radical enough in his view.

I thought it was of the tongue but some expert in onTV mentioned the dutch cartoonist in relation to the shooting. Some indirect connection he was making I guess. I didn’t catch the whole interview.

I just saw this video from Michael Moore’s Web site that shows how progressive Norway is. I suppose there is a lot for a right wing nut to be upset about.

Found this and this suggesting that the guy was neither very Christian (stating, essentially, that what he liked was a Christianoid Europe that would foster the growth of Science and keep those pesky Muslims at bay; he himself is rather agnostic), nor particularly right-wing (being on the conservative side of a more-liberal-than-thou party).

Hey, Just weighing in here. We are all devastated. The man seems to be an extreme nationalist/fascist. He stated that the worst thing that can happen to him is that he will be forgotten, so I am forgetting him but remembering his victims and their families instead. (This includes our royal family. The crown princesses step brother was killed.)

The killer being an extreme nationalist/fascist makes this even more bitterly ironic.

Norway is a big country but with a small population mainly concentrated in the Oslo area. The people are mostly of Germanic Nordic descent but in recent years there has been increasing immigration by foreign workers and asylum seekers from Asia, mainly Chinese and Filipino and the Middle East, mainly Iraqis and Palestinians.

I think this is what worried Breivik, he thought his country was being taken over by foreigners, particularly Muslims and he appeared to hate the Norwegian political parties that allowed this to happen. In his mind his attack was not against the Norwegian people but against these political parties. His concerns about immigration are not entirely irrational and are shared by many people in Norway and further afield.

@cazzie – The court made the right decision. Denying him publicity. We are all devastated. But it’s also remarkable and uplifting to see how the people in Oslo and elsewhere in Norway support each other. And how all countries in Europe and elsewhere support Norway. This was a crime against all humanity. It’s a small world and we are in this together. And we stick together.

@laureth…. omg. I dislike that Beck character even more now. I wish someone would make him stop spreading his words of hate too!... like a court ordered gag order or something, nothing violent.

@mattbrowne thank you for your kind words. We flew home today from our holiday in the US and I had tears on the plane as I was reading the Prince’s speech that was printed on the front of a leading Norwegian Newspaper. I’ll see if I can find a link to a translated version. (You have to remember as you read it, that his wife lost a half-brother in the shooting.) http://fillingspaces.wordpress.com/2011/07/26/the-crown-princes-speech/

@laureth, @cazzie I don’t know that he was that far off; the idea of a camp being run by a political party smacks strongly of an effort at indoctrination. Granted, I know nothing about the actual camp other than the fact that it was full of kids, and that it was run by a political party.

@Nullo And religious camps are not about indoctrination?

@Nullo , Are you saying that the appropriate response to a camp where people are taught something that you are opposed to is to kill them?

@DominicX Not political indoctrination, at least.

@LostInParadise Yes, because that’s EXACTLY what I said. :\

@Nullo Beck is an ignorant moron. Please read more about the camps and what they do before commenting yourself.

@Nullo – Re: “I don’t know that [Beck] was that far off [about those kids being like the Hitler Youth]; the idea of a camp being run by a political party smacks strongly of an effort at indoctrination.”

Do this and this strike you the same way?

How about this?

Tell me if these values sound like a camp for teaching young Nazis…
Below are the copy and paste of the AUF’s values from their website:
http://auf.no/-/page/show/Dette-mener-vi?sandbox_id=1063610
The capitals are my English translation of them.

1. Frihet for alle mennesker. FREEDOM FOR ALL PEOPLE.
2. Rettferdighet i et samfunn der alle har like muligheter. JUSTICE IN A SOCIETY WHERE EVERYONE HAS EQUAL OPPORTUNITY. 

3. Solidaritet i et samfunn der mennesker tar ansvar for hverandre. SOLIDARITY IN A SOCIETY WHERE PEOPLE HAVE RESPONSIBILITY TO EACH OTHER.

4. Deltakelse i et samfunn der alle er med på å skape framtida.
 CONTRIBUTING IN A SOCIETY WHERE EVERYONE TAKES PART IN MAKING THE FUTURE
5. Respekt for naturen og en samfunnsutvikling i pakt med naturens tåleevne. RESPECT FOR NATURE AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT IN COVENANT WITH NATURES LEVEL OF TOLERANCE.

Suddenly, it sounds a bit more like the Girl and Boy Scouts, eh?

Beck is a moron

What a wonderful speech by Crown Prince Haakon! Thank you for sharing this, @cazzie.

@Nullo – I’m confused and also a bit irritated by your remark of ‘a camp being run by a political party smacking strongly of an effort at indoctrination’.

1) Owning the facilities of a camp does not necessarily mean the owner “runs” the actual event
2) Even if adult party members are involved in the actual camp event, this doesn’t mean they indoctrinate any of the young participants

Social democratic parties, as well as all moderately conservative parties in Europe do not have a reputation of indoctrinating young people. They offer platforms so that teenagers can learn to get involved in a pluralistic society, form opinions, listen to different opinions, handling dissent, feeling responsible for the future of a country. Many people don’t even vote. They don’t care about politics whatsoever. Not a good sign in any democracy. So please let’s be fair of what is youth event was all about. I think they are great. We have these in Germany as well. And they are not about indoctrination.

My 17 year old daughter (who is the asker of this question), recently attended Girls State, a highly respected political camp, (which is run by the American Legion and has existed since 1937) right here in the USA. Would anyone refer to that as a Hitler Youth type of thing? Ridiculous.

Our hearts go out to Norway, whatever the reason for the attacks.

@augustlan , Thank you.