France - Mother and Daughters Stabbed

[Divine Wind]

Finally:

...

Understood in the context of our human fascination with violence, the power of society, and the twisting force of true believerism, suicide bombing becomes a reasonable, albeit extreme, human adaptation. It is not a crazed act of insane individuals, but a social ritual. While its proximal causes are shaped by the current parameters of a specific group, its ultimate causes emerge from the grouping impulse inherent in human nature. For a society (or a group) that perceives itself as engaged in a territorial or ideological struggle for its very survival against overpowering enemies, it is not irrational to embrace, promote and celebrate individual acts of great sacrifice for the cause; particularly if the enemy is deemed less than human, as all enemies are always deemed; particularly if those acts are intoxicatingly brutal; particularly if they are shown to be effective weapons in the fight. For individuals under the pressure of a society, and in the throes of true believerism, suicide bombing can become an attractive option...


Understanding the Suicide Bomber

An excellent article, although it appears to only scratch the surface. Obviously "True Believerism" is psychological and it doesn't affect everyone to the level of becoming a suicide bomber. He didn't go into any factual dating backing up his conclusions nor explain both why some place IEDs while others commit suicide.

Also, the last paragraph is both interesting, but paradoxical: "This is also good news because, like heroin, true believerism, while potent and addictive, has an inherently limited appeal, and tends to deplete and kill its own adherents over time. It's good news also because societies change, often quickly and radically, and sometimes for the better. All around the world, people manage to live peacefully with, near, or among those who in the recent past have killed and brutalized them."

Not many of the worlds 1.6 Billion Muslims are addicted to "true believerism" even though they may be pious, practicing Muslims as shown by the fact how rare such attacks happen. It takes a "special kind of personality" to kill themselves for a belief. I think Dr. Shpancer needs to back up this up with more research because there is obviously a selection process going on.

 

[Divine Wind]

More articles about the sociology and psychology of suicide bombers.

The Social Psychology of Suicide Terrorism

.....There is a wide variety of motives that seem connected to suicide terrorism beyond rational considerations. It is important to underline the influence of not 'outcome-oriented' motivations that have encouraged people to become a suicide bomber or support suicide terrorism (Kruglanski et al., 2009). Thus, emotions related to pain and personal loss, humiliation, hate or vengeance can play a decisive motivational role (Bloom, 2005; Ricolfi, 2005). But norms can also be crucial. For instance, based on information extracted from interviews, Atran (2006) has suggested that deep sense of obligation to become “martyrs” proves the prevalence of non-instrumental motivations among religious oriented suicide bombers.

Another argument against the view of suicide terrorism as entirely rational could be deducted from the own limitations of the rational choice theory. In its earlier version, rational choice theory assumed that human rationality tends to be almost perfect. However, psychological research has shown that the rationality of human beliefs and choices is bounded and imperfect because of the own cognitive limitations of the human mind and its interferences with emotion and motivation (Simon, 1995; Kahneman, 2011). A psychosocial approach to explaining any terrorist behaviour has to bear in mind the principle of bounded rationality. This approach is coherent with the following consideration from Elster (2006): “In itself, there is nothing irrational in the willingness to sacrifice one´s life for a cause, an even less in the willingness to send others to their death for it…nevertheless in some case suicide attacks fall short of being fully rational due to the instability of the underlying motivations or also because some attackers are subject to irrational belief formation”.......

What You Don't Understand about Suicide Attacks
...However, a growing number of scholars are now challenging these assumptions. Ariel Merari’s research team conducted psychological tests of preemptively arrested suicide bombers and found evidence of suicidal tendencies, depressive tendencies, and previous (non-terrorist) suicide attempts. David Lester found that many female suicide bombers seem driven, at least in part, by post-traumatic stress disorder, hopelessness, and despair. And in several recent articles, I summarize evidence of psychological similarities between suicide terrorists and people who commit nonviolent suicides, coerced suicides, and mass-murder-suicides.....

 

[Tilly]

...The Moroccan national, named as Mohamed B, was known to police for petty crimes but not radicalisation.

While he "didn't say a word" during the attack, according to the victims, during questioning he shouted "Allahu Akbar" three times and then refused to talk. No Islamist material was found at his home.

He later told the prosecutor he had suffered from "depression and schizophrenia for several years". On permanent sick leave since 2009, he said he had stopped taken his medication six months ago.

However, medical and psychiatric experts found "no evidence of any pathology of a psychiatric nature"...


Alps knife attacker stabbed family after father of victims 'scratched thigh' in front of his wife

 

[Divine Wind]

All interesting. Why do you think a person would just destroy their life? The previous articles point out theories. All we can really say for certain at this point is "That ain't normal". The Nice, France attacker reportedly had been planning the attack for weeks. We'll have to wait to find out about the Munich attackers.

 

[ChrisL]

All interesting. Why do you think a person would just destroy their life? The previous articles point out theories. All we can really say for certain at this point is "That ain't normal". The Nice, France attacker reportedly had been planning the attack for weeks. We'll have to wait to find out about the Munich attackers.

Why do people risk their lives by joining the military during war time? It's because they THINK they are doing the right thing and sacrificing for the greater good.

 

[Tilly]

All interesting. Why do you think a person would just destroy their life? The previous articles point out theories. All we can really say for certain at this point is "That ain't normal". The Nice, France attacker reportedly had been planning the attack for weeks. We'll have to wait to find out about the Munich attackers.

I think we will have to agree to differ here, DW But thank you for the links. ATM I suspect the Munich attackers are far right rather than Islamists, but who knows? Sick and tired of all this crap. It feels like it never stops. Sigh.

 

[Divine Wind]

I think we will have to agree to differ here, DW But thank you for the links. ATM I suspect the Munich attackers are far right rather than Islamists, but who knows? Sick and tired of all this crap. It feels like it never stops. Sigh.

Knowledge is Power. Unfortunately, as Alvin Toffler pointed out, too much "knowledge" or, more specifically, too much information can result in overload.

Would you sleep better at night not knowing thousands of innocent people, many of them children, are being abused, starved and/or murdered in Africa every day? Would it disturb your sleep to see pictures of them dying, bleeding, etc every fucking day on television? It would me. I turn off those ASPCA commercials on CNN because, as emotionally heart-tugging as they are, it's too much. I love dogs, but also know I can't save them all. Even for only a buck a day.

The terror attacks both at home and abroad are sad, but we're talking about a few casualties in nations of dozens of millions. Collectively, these nations have militaries that could scour the entire ME clean in the world's greatest example of technological mass killing of humanity, many of them innocent. Millions dead in a flash. Millions more dying of radiation poisoning. It would take a few weeks, but everything inside the kill zone would be dead regardless of race, religion, gender or age. Would this make you feel better? It wouldn't me because it would be wrong. Yes, we need to neutralize the terrorists and their supporters, but killing millions of innocent people along with them isn't Christian.

 

[Divine Wind]

Why do people risk their lives by joining the military during war time? It's because they THINK they are doing the right thing and sacrificing for the greater good.

I joined the military to kill bad guys. Dying, much less committing suicide, was never part of the plan.

 

[Tilly]

I think we will have to agree to differ here, DW But thank you for the links. ATM I suspect the Munich attackers are far right rather than Islamists, but who knows? Sick and tired of all this crap. It feels like it never stops. Sigh.

Knowledge is Power. Unfortunately, as Alvin Toffler pointed out, too much "knowledge" or, more specifically, too much information can result in overload.

Would you sleep better at night not knowing thousands of innocent people, many of them children, are being abused, starved and/or murdered in Africa every day? Would it disturb your sleep to see pictures of them dying, bleeding, etc every fucking day on television? It would me. I turn off those ASPCA commercials on CNN because, as emotionally heart-tugging as they are, it's too much. I love dogs, but also know I can't save them all. Even for only a buck a day.

The terror attacks both at home and abroad are sad, but we're talking about a few casualties in nations of dozens of millions. Collectively, these nations have militaries that could scour the entire ME clean in the world's greatest example of technological mass killing of humanity, many of them innocent. Millions dead in a flash. Millions more dying of radiation poisoning. It would take a few weeks, but everything inside the kill zone would be dead regardless of race, religion, gender or age. Would this make you feel better? It wouldn't me because it would be wrong. Yes, we need to neutralize the terrorists and their supporters, but killing millions of innocent people along with them isn't Christian.

Do you have me confused with someone else? Read my sig and then explain yourself man!!!

 

[ChrisL]

Why do people risk their lives by joining the military during war time? It's because they THINK they are doing the right thing and sacrificing for the greater good.

I joined the military to kill bad guys. Dying, much less committing suicide, was never part of the plan.

You weren't raised in that type of culture. If you were raised in a culture where sacrificing your life for the "greater good" (allegedly) was encouraged, you would think differently.

 

[Divine Wind]

You weren't raised in that type of culture. If you were raised in a culture where sacrificing your life for the "greater good" (allegedly) was encouraged, you would think differently.

1,600,000,000 Muslims. If all were raised to kill themselves trying to kill infidels, about 1,599,990,000 are slacking, falling down on the job and not very well trained.

 

[Tilly]

You weren't raised in that type of culture. If you were raised in a culture where sacrificing your life for the "greater good" (allegedly) was encouraged, you would think differently.

1,600,000,000 Muslims. If all were raised to kill themselves trying to kill infidels, about 1,599,990,000 are slacking, falling down on the job and not very well trained.

Not at all. Not all Muslims have to actively engage in warfare jihad or become shahids, and many are exempt. However, those not directly involved are expected to support financially and in any other way that benefits Islam. It's all in the good book. Have you read it?

 

[Divine Wind]

Not at all. Not all Muslims have to actively engage in warfare jihad or become shahids, and many are exempt. However, those not directly involved are expected to support financially and in any other way that benefits Islam. It's all in the good book. Have you read it?

So unlike others here, you don't believe 1.6 Billion Muslims are brainwashed to kill all infidels?

The "Good Book" also tells us to put homosexuals and adulterers to death (Leviticus 20:13 and 20:10, respectively), that slaves must submit to their masters even if those masters are cruel (1 Peter 2:18), that no one, not even veterans, who have had their genitals cut off or crushed can go to church (Deuteronomy 23:1), that looking at another woman with desire is akin to adultery...and we all know the penalty for adultery! (Matthew 5:28). Yes, the "Good Book" is very vicious and ruthless at times, but most Christians don't practice the vicious, violent parts. Just a few like the anti-abortionists who commit murder or start cults where they marry girls barely in their teens.

 

[ChrisL]

Not at all. Not all Muslims have to actively engage in warfare jihad or become shahids, and many are exempt. However, those not directly involved are expected to support financially and in any other way that benefits Islam. It's all in the good book. Have you read it?

So unlike others here, you don't believe 1.6 Billion Muslims are brainwashed to kill all infidels?

The "Good Book" also tells us to put homosexuals and adulterers to death (Leviticus 20:13 and 20:10, respectively), that slaves must submit to their masters even if those masters are cruel (1 Peter 2:18), that no one, not even veterans, who have had their genitals cut off or crushed can go to church (Deuteronomy 23:1), that looking at another woman with desire is akin to adultery...and we all know the penalty for adultery! (Matthew 5:28). Yes, the "Good Book" is very vicious and ruthless at times, but most Christians don't practice the vicious, violent parts. Just a few like the anti-abortionists who commit murder or start cults where they marry girls barely in their teens.

Most Christians don't practice much of what they preach.

 

[Tilly]

Not at all. Not all Muslims have to actively engage in warfare jihad or become shahids, and many are exempt. However, those not directly involved are expected to support financially and in any other way that benefits Islam. It's all in the good book. Have you read it?

So unlike others here, you don't believe 1.6 Billion Muslims are brainwashed to kill all infidels?

The "Good Book" also tells us to put homosexuals and adulterers to death (Leviticus 20:13 and 20:10, respectively), that slaves must submit to their masters even if those masters are cruel (1 Peter 2:18), that no one, not even veterans, who have had their genitals cut off or crushed can go to church (Deuteronomy 23:1), that looking at another woman with desire is akin to adultery...and we all know the penalty for adultery! (Matthew 5:28). Yes, the "Good Book" is very vicious and ruthless at times, but most Christians don't practice the vicious, violent parts. Just a few like the anti-abortionists who commit murder or start cults where they marry girls barely in their teens.

By the good book, I meant the Quran. However, since we are back on the Bible and Christians in a thread about a Muslim wannabe murderer, I have no problem whatsoever condemning Christians who put to death homosexuals and adulterers; who indulge in slavery; who prevent those who've had their genitals mutilated - for whatever reason -attending church - not sure where this stuff is happening in the West - but I wholeheartedly condemn it - and I condemn those who kill abortionists and marry underage girls. Anything else?

 

[Divine Wind]

By the good book, I meant the Quran. However, since we are back on the Bible and Christians in a thread about a Muslim wannabe murderer, I have no problem whatsoever condemning Christians who put to death homosexuals and adulterers; who indulge in slavery; who prevent those who've had their genitals mutilated - for whatever reason -attending church - not sure where this stuff is happening in the West - but I wholeheartedly condemn it - and I condemn those who kill abortionists and marry underage girls. Anything else?

You're the one who brought up "the good book", not me. The only book I've ever heard called "the good book" was the Holy Bible, never the Koran.