Wrong use of term "rebel"

They can't even make headway with heavy NATO air support. They don't have the support of the Libyan people. The eventual winner is decided whether we like it or not. 24.159.24.36 (talk) 17:31, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

"They don't have the support of the Libyan people." Eh? Where are you getting this from? I'm getting my news from PBS and Al Jazerra. Where are you getting your news from?

They can't make headway because Qaddafi's side still has heavy weapons and is able to afford foreign mercs, while the opposition is disorganized and only has small arms, some rockets, and some anti-aircraft guns on pickup trucks. (And I haven't seen much of the last in recent news reports.) If they could get organized, they might start making headway. I'm hoping they might be able to get the oil flowing again and buy some weapons on their own, but that's probably a pipe dream.

Just because the rebels don't look like they'll win doesn't mean they won't. The media calling them rebels constitutes bias IMHO.

I'm not sure why 'rebel' implies they will lose. They are rebelling against the status quo of the last ~40 years. That makes them rebels.

It just sounds that way. People who lose are called 'rebels', while those who win are called 'revolutionaries'. You can't call Washington a rebel.

Why not? He was, after all.

Because they just don't... :P There isn't a reason. :)

Ah, but that's kind of my point. We aren't 'them'.

But since it's the way it is, rebels are associated with losers. HK sources mainly use 'opposition' instead of 'rebels'.

"I'm not sure why 'rebel' implies they will lose. They are rebelling against the status quo of the last ~40 years. That makes them rebels."

But 'rebels', in common usage, is used for those who lose. This implication is unrelated to the definition of the word itself.

I dispute that. Your examples, so far, have been in the past tense. The news is written in the present tense.

Maybe, I guess.

A Rebel in my opinion is someone who rejects a generally accepted thing, protocol, principle etc, but the Lybian "rebels" are rejecting dictatorism. Just my opinion, we could go look in the Oxford dictionary for exact definition of the term "rebel". Nolween (talk) 11:07, 19 April 2011 (UTC)