Re: Yes it's off topic but who cares right now.

[Valdis.Kletnieks () vt edu]

On Thu, 13 Sep 2001 09:50:59 +0200, Hank Nussbacher said:
> article called "The Making of a Martyr" (Aug 27).  The Christian term 
> martyr refers to someone who was killed at the hand of their enemy due to 
> their religious beliefs.  A suicide bomber takes his own life and those of 
> his enemies.  For those with a Christian background, don't you consider it 
> an insult to your religion to have a suicide bomber called a martyr after 
> Saint Stephen?

Unfortunately, unlike the hacker/cracker linguistic debate, the English
language does not have another word for "martyr".

Hmm.. if the Vatican were granted an algorithm patent on the concept of
becoming a martyr, and then sued for damages every time it happend,
it would put a crimp in the terrorist's finances.  After all, prior art
or obviousness doesn't seem to be a problem for other software patents.
If it hadn't slipped into mainstream usage, they could also have gone
the trademark route, and stamped 'Martyr(TM)' on some saints, and sued
for infringement....

Naah. I think that word went the way of linoleum, but a millenia before...

On the other hand, does anybody know the equivalent Arabic term?  Perhaps
using that might make for an alternative - it seems that most of the
candidates that make the news are Muslim or Judeo-Christian.  But then,
I'm sure that CNN just isn't reporting on that sort of thing when
it involves the other half of the world population....

/Valdis