1990s Decade Quiz

Surprised that Magic Johnson's 1991 HIV announcement isn't on this! I thought it would for sure be one of the top 10 things to happen in the 1990's!

Hutus requires the "s"? I scratched my head for a while wondering why "Hutu" didn't work.

Agreed - it says "what tribe" and the tribe is called the Hutu tribe.

"famous" ;-)

Less famous than Mother Teresa, but still an eminent conductor.

Toy Story was released in 1995

Hutu should be called an ethnic group or a people but not a tribe.

Perhaps accept Jeltsin? Using an Y never occured to me, couldnt figure out what was wrong

But that's not his name.

All around better times.. except maybe for the quality of the comic book movies. And Internet speeds.

And memes

The 90s was a time before the meaning of this interesting word and concept had been corrupted to mean something very silly, so I disagree. The 90s were a better time for memes.

So better to live in the collapsed pile of rot? Yeah that makes as much sense as most of your comments.

Definitely on the ascent. Not sure about the peak. The peak may have been sometime around 1997-1999 (and arguably up to 4 decades earlier), but I think it could have also been as late as 2008-2015. Depends on what factors you're looking at.

I don't think Aafat was ever called a terrorist in Spain, he was just the Palestinian leader (at least in the 90s). I guess it's an American thing to call terrorists those whose fights you don't like.

I translate from German Wikipedia: "In 1957 he co-founded and later led the Palestinian Fatah, which carried out numerous terrorist and bomb attacks on Israeli, Jordanian, and Lebanese targets."

Arafat is absolutely a terrorist by definition, although everyone is entitled to their own opinion on the subject.

Calling people "whose fights you don't like" terrorists, as well as asserting that text-book definition terrorists are not terrorists if their fight is one you do like, is a form of rank stupidity exhibited by people all over the world, including in but certainly not exclusive to America. Which also apparently happens in Spain.

On the other hand, calling Arafat a terrorist is not a form of this stupidity. Arafat is definitely a terrorist. He advocated and helped organize attacks against civilian non-military targets. Decades after founding Fatah, originally a terrorist organization, even Arafat and the organization itself renounced the previous MO that they helped pioneer and popularize, being so undeniably reprehensible that it became a disadvantage to their political goals as it was.

I did not provide a definition for terrorist in my comment above so I hope you were replying to someone else whose comment has since gone missing and not to me, or else you'd look silly, or at least over-eager to make inferences to try and prove some point.

If the hypothetical person you were responding to did provide a definition for "terrorist" that applied to Tony Blair, then, they were using a poor definition of the word.

If the definition of "terrorist" that you imagined I was giving was one you inferred to be "person who advocates and organizes attacks against civilian non-military targets"... then... no. This obviously does not apply to George Bush or Tony Blair. Flawed politicians as they both were, they never did that. Implying that they did, in a way similar to Arafat, is absurd.

You can find my preferred, precise, and superior definition for terrorism on this quiz

A case can be made that Bush and Blair are both war criminals. Not a particularly compelling case... but... a case can be made.

However, being a war criminal doesn't make one a terrorist.

He didn't renounce violence until the late 80s. And then only so that he could try and secure the destruction of Israel through peaceful, rather than violence means. A change in tactics. Before this he was definitely unambiguously a terrorist.

Should really be accepting dwarf planets or as someone said earlier, exoplanets. Just 'planets' is such a vague answer.

Also Foot and Mouth disease should work aswell for Mad Cow disease. Whilst they are different disseases both of them killed British cows in the 1990's, frustrated me that.

Is it not curious that the two most inspiring people in this quiz are currently the most-guessed and the least-guessed?

The Spice Girls and OJ Simpson aren't most or least guessed... What are you talking about?

Also Kalbahamut, your definition of terrorist would have to include Mandela - who thinks that?

and which definition for terrorist are you imagining that I gave that I did not give?

I honestly don't know enough about all of the activities that Mandela was involved in prior to becoming president for me to say he was or was not a terrorist. He may have been. He may not have been. Seriously, I don't know. But in either case, I still have not given a definition for terrorist in this comments section and you're the 2nd person who implied I had. Click on the linked quiz I left above and you can find a good (in fact, the best) definition for terrorism. By this definition, Yasser Arafat absolutely was a terrorist. And this is not controversial amongst serious persons who care what words mean.

I don't know about Mandela. I'd have to read more on the subject.

No, my definition is in fact the best. I could explain why at length if I felt like it, with logical proofs and mathematical formulas if you wanted me to.

Fun fact, Kerensky was briefly president of Russia in the 1910s but was not elected to that position (i.e. the quiz is right).

Can't a freedom fighter also be a terrorist at the same time?

I'm concerned about what appears to be a pattern across several quizzes where the language is pretty unabashedly anti-Palestinian while remaining mostly neutral on other fronts. Is Jetpunk taking an official stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by these language choices, which don't add up with the neutral language it uses to address other global conflicts, or is this a simple mistake by the quiz's creator? I would appreciate clarification on this question.

Alexquiz17 is right that the same logic that would indict Arafat as a terrorist would also indict Mandela. And yet Mandela (correctly) is not called one on this quiz. There are many possible word choices that are similarly neutral on the question of Arafat--"political figure," or "controversial political figure," even, and I think the quiz's current wording is dishonest at best, unless Jetpunk truly wishes to pick sides on this issue.

kalbahamut's discussion a few comment threads above with multiple users about the meaning of the word "terrorist" proves, if nothing else, that the word is loaded and shouldn't be used haphazardly without careful prior consideration. Given that a significant portion of the world--myself included--would not lump in Arafat with, say, Timothy McVeigh, and would actually find the comparison quite offensive, I'm somewhat uncomfortable with the lapse in Jetpunk's usual neutrality.

Using the term to describe McVeigh and not Arafat, because it offends people, would be the haphazard thing to do. That's the thing that leads to the word being loaded, political, and in effect meaningless. Applying it to those you dislike and rejecting the fair application to those you do.

The careful, deliberate, and fair thing to do would be to use an objective and consistent standard and a precise, carefully-worded definition most consistent with popular historical usage. In every case. Regardless of personal feelings, politics, or popularity.

And, if you do that, then Arafat is definitely a terrorist. When he and Fatah renounced terrorism, they were renouncing the things that they used to commonly do... even Arafat knew that Arafat was a terrorist. Look on the quiz I linked to above and the explanation for the Oklahoma City bombing question (which I do count as terrorism) to see why, actually, McVeigh is closer to not being a terrorist than Arafat is.

As a small side note, my suggested wording is actually a bit problematic, since both suggested alternatives would also include Rabin as a possible answer. Perhaps the term "Palestinian political leader" could be used instead, although it does give away a little bit more of the answer in the question itself.

It's one of my all-time least favorite Tarantino films, and as a teenager (when the film came out) I also thought it was very overrated, but as I grew up and matured I came to at least appreciate why it was generally so well regarded. If my development as a thinking individual had been completely arrested somewhere around sophomore year of high school I think I'd have a lot more in common with some of the posters on the site that disagree with me most ardently. That was when I was at my most religious and priggish, as well.

i agree with everyone, referring to Yasser Arafat as a terrorist is extremely biased on an objective quiz.

good. Go away.

You're still here?