Were extreme suffragettes regarded as terrorists?

[dipsydoodle]

A century ago, British women still did not have the vote and violent protests by the suffragettes were escalating. Were these women seen at the time as something akin to terrorists, or as activists legitimately fighting for a political cause?

Frustrated by the lack of reform at the start of the 20th Century, hundreds of suffragettes were jailed after taking part in protests.

Until 1912 the campaigning was largely within the law, although protesters had chained themselves to railings and disturbed the peace. But activism grew to include planting bombs, smashing shop windows and acts of arson.

Targets were not just buildings, even artworks were mutilated - most notably Velazquez's famous Rokeby Venus, repeatedly slashed with a meat cleaver at the National Gallery in 1914.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16945901

[LuvNewcastle]

1. Some of the more radical among them could have been

regarded as such. Women's Suffrage was related to the Women's Christian Temperance Movement, and some of those people definitely crossed the line.

[link:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Nation|

[DCKit]

2. Great catch!!!! I like the way your brain works.

I think the label depends on who's running the Administration at the time.

You're either/or: Terrorists or Heroes

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. Depemds on who is writing history, too.

Was the Boston Tea Party a terrorist act?

[DCKit]

4. Even better, 'cause it's the historians who decide.

Smartass.

[BlueToTheBone]

6. Although the term wasn't around,

women were jailed in horrible conditions to break the backs of the suffragettes. There's an incredible movie about that time called "Iron Jawed Angels" which I highly recommend.