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A mass murder (massacre) involves the murder of large numbers of people either by a state or an individual. This should not be confused with serial killers, who usually tend to kill one person (or perhaps two) at a time.The largest mass killings in history have been attempts to exterminate ethnic and other groups; for more about this subject see genocide. This article refers to non-genocidal mass killings.
Although "genocide" does not necessarily require actual killing, only acting on a plan to exterminate an ethnic group, mass murder by definition involves killing a large number of people.
1 Mass murder by the state
R. J. Rummel, a political scientist, coined the word democide to cover mass murder by a state. Some killings commonly viewed as genocide are actually democide or mass murder because they involve killing for political or cultural reasons.
Examples include:
- Killings in Cambodia of the intellectual and cultural elite.
- Killings in Stalinist Russia of Kulaks, alleged Trotskyists and other alleged enemies of the regime, most of whom were ethnic Russians.
- Civilian populations buried alive with bulldozers by the Japanese in China.
- The massacre of Huguenots in the St. Bartholomew's Day MassacreBartholomew's Day Massacre was a wave of Catholic mob violence against the Huguenots (French Protestants) starting on August 24, 1572, and lasting for several months. It marked a turning-point in the French Wars of Religion by stiffening Huguenot intransi.
- The slaughter of the civilian population of Avaricum by the Roman army under Julius CaesarAlternative meanings: Julius Caesar (disambiguation). Gaius Julius Caesar ( Latin: C·IVLIVS·C·F·C·N·CAESAR) ( July 13, 100 BC March 15, 44 BC) was a Roman military and political leader whose conquest of Gallia Comata extended the Roman world all the way t.
Some people also regard the bombing of urban areas during warFor other uses of War, see War (disambiguation). War is conflict, between relatively large groups of people, which involves physical force inflicted by the use of weapons. Other terms for war include armed conflict hostilities and police action''. See Limtime to constitute mass murder by the state.
2 Mass murder by terrorists
In recent years, terrorists have performed acts of mass murder as acts of intimidation, and to draw attention to their causes. Examples of major terrorist incidents involving mass murder include:
It should be noted that many of these are very much American examples; in fact, the USA is relatively untouched by mass terrorist killings (when compared to Northern Ireland, the Basque region of Spain, Chechnya, Indonesia and the like).
