The root causes of terrorism

[Katzndogz]

To imagine that terrorisim comes from poverty, or from some sense of desperation or some jealousy over our freedom shows a profound ignorance of islam in general. Out of all of the terrorists who attacked on 911, not one came from a family considered poor. They were all affluent young men. The paliestinian suicide bombers are all college educated some dropping out to take the vest.

When a fundamentalist islamic comes here they aren't impressed by our freedom, they are repelled by it. Our hedonism and celebration of overt sexuality doesn't make them glad to be in a free country. Everything they were told, no matter how outlandish, is validated as true. Yes the women are immodest, yes we really do accommodate sinful homosexuality, yes we prove on a daily basis in every way that we are unfit to exist. Freedom of the kind we have is an illness, an infection, a virus, and islam is the cure. When a fundamentalist sees women half dressed and overly made up, they are not only horrified at such immodesty, but pity the woman who has no man to care for her and protect her. They have a deep contempt for the men who permit their women to expose themselves like that. To the fundamentalist, male and female, it isn't the veil that subjegates women, it's eyeshadow.

To understand how islam views the west, it might be more beneficial to pay more attention to converts than those raised in the middle east and islamic culture. What turned John Walker Lindh from a liberal American teenager into an islamic terrorist? He certainly didn't come from poverty. His family is wealthy. It wasn't that he was raised in a religious household. His family is atheist. It wasn't a lack of sexual freedom and bias. His father put on a dress and announced to the family that he was leaving them for another man and Mother Walker was glad that her husband came out in all honesty. Jihad Johnny absolutely wasn't jealous of our "freedom and wealth". He was deeply repelled by the license that freedom afforded. It wasn't freedom, it was discpline and structure that he wanted and that, if nothing else, is what islam offers. That's what islam offers to converts and why there are so many of them. The more liberal a country is, the faster islam grows. The islam terrorist IS fighting for freedom and that's what we may never understand. It's just not our particular brand of freedom. To the fundamentalist, there is freedom under shariah, but only chains binding us to evil without it.

If we continue to cling to the mistaken understanding that islam is the repository of the desperate poor, then you guarantee that islam will dominate one day. Islam has absolutely nothing to do with desperation or poverty.

 

[Saigon]

Katz -

Interesting points, and I enjoyed reading your thoughts, but keep in mind that no one is saying Islam itself is linked to poverty.

Dubai and Bahrain don't seem too badly off to me.

My point is that poverty provides a kind of fuel on which terror feeds, not only in the Islamic world, but right across the world.

I take your point that many high profile terrorists have come from priveleged backgrounds - Carlos the Jackal did, and so did Osama - so clearly they are driven by something other than poverty. Possibly they feel some kind of regiteous indignation on behalf of their 'brothers', possibly guilt, possibly they are just bored....who knows? (We saw the same with Baader Meinhoff and the Japanese Red Fighting Brigades)

But these guys are the rock stars of global terror...the brains and the tacticians.

I wonder how many people would follow them if they weren't poor and desperate. It is the followers who, more often than not, strap on the suicide bomb belts, or throw petrol bombs at the cops or who fire rockets into Israel. Most of them, I suspect, are poor.

 

[Artevelde]

Basically..yeah.

No American would put up with a foreign military base on American soil..yet it expects the world to put up with American bases..or governments chosen by Americans.

Sorta silly.

You really have no knowledge of the world do you?

You really have no knowledge of history and reality, do you?

Many US military bases abroad are there at the demand of the countries they are in.

 

[Artevelde]

Katz -

Interesting points, and I enjoyed reading your thoughts, but keep in mind that no one is saying Islam itself is linked to poverty.

Dubai and Bahrain don't seem too badly off to me.

My point is that poverty provides a kind of fuel on which terror feeds, not only in the Islamic world, but right across the world.

I take your point that many high profile terrorists have come from priveleged backgrounds - Carlos the Jackal did, and so did Osama - so clearly they are driven by something other than poverty. Possibly they feel some kind of regiteous indignation on behalf of their 'brothers', possibly guilt, possibly they are just bored....who knows? (We saw the same with Baader Meinhoff and the Japanese Red Fighting Brigades)

But these guys are the rock stars of global terror...the brains and the tacticians.

I wonder how many people would follow them if they weren't poor and desperate. It is the followers who, more often than not, strap on the suicide bomb belts, or throw petrol bombs at the cops or who fire rockets into Israel. Most of them, I suspect, are poor.

As I've said before, you're throwing things together that are fundamentally different.

Poverty provides no fuel to terrorism. It sometimes allows terrorists to prey on certain groups. But the root causes are very different.

 

[mudwhistle]

The jihadi terrorist movement is in a class all of its own. Its motivation is not political or national but fanatical religious and global. Its aims are to destroy everyone standing in the way of its global vision. It has been raging now for about 35 years. It is bound to remain one of the major global challenges for the coming decades.

Seriously, you don't have a clue about this subject.

Basically..yeah.

No American would put up with a foreign military base on American soil..yet it expects the world to put up with American bases..or governments chosen by Americans.

Sorta silly.

As in the case of Somalia the world begged us to help. So we help and the locals start shooting at us because the danger is past and because we're infidels we're unwelcome.

The only country I remember that appreciated what we did for them almost unanimously has been Kuwait.

 

[Saigon]

The only country I remember that appreciated what we did for them almost unanimously has been Kuwait.

I don't think that is true - I think most people in Europe (in particular countries like France, Holland etc) appreciate enormously the massive contribution made by the US in defeating Hitler.

I'd guess people in Libya are also fairly happy with the US help in getting their country back.

But in other instances, such as Somalia, the US have gone in with poor intelligence and a bad strategy, and that hasn't won too many hearts and minds.

 

[Artevelde]

Seriously, you don't have a clue about this subject.

Basically..yeah.

No American would put up with a foreign military base on American soil..yet it expects the world to put up with American bases..or governments chosen by Americans.

Sorta silly.

As in the case of Somalia the world begged us to help. So we help and the locals start shooting at us because the danger is past and because we're infidels we're unwelcome.

The only country I remember that appreciated what we did for them almost unanimously has been Kuwait.

I have a longer memory than that.

 

[Katzndogz]

Katz -

Interesting points, and I enjoyed reading your thoughts, but keep in mind that no one is saying Islam itself is linked to poverty.

Dubai and Bahrain don't seem too badly off to me.

My point is that poverty provides a kind of fuel on which terror feeds, not only in the Islamic world, but right across the world.

I take your point that many high profile terrorists have come from priveleged backgrounds - Carlos the Jackal did, and so did Osama - so clearly they are driven by something other than poverty. Possibly they feel some kind of regiteous indignation on behalf of their 'brothers', possibly guilt, possibly they are just bored....who knows? (We saw the same with Baader Meinhoff and the Japanese Red Fighting Brigades)

But these guys are the rock stars of global terror...the brains and the tacticians.

I wonder how many people would follow them if they weren't poor and desperate. It is the followers who, more often than not, strap on the suicide bomb belts, or throw petrol bombs at the cops or who fire rockets into Israel. Most of them, I suspect, are poor.

This kind of terrorism doesn't feed on poverty and poverty has nothing to do with islamic fundamentalism. They are terrorists because the kind of evil we represent should not be permitted to survive.

Because we want to make our own excuses and reasons for their actions, there is, unfortunately and disastroously, no way we can defend outselves. We will always be fighting the wrong thing.

 

[Saigon]

Because we want to make our own excuses and reasons for their actions, there is, unfortunately and disastroously, no way we can defend outselves. We will always be fighting the wrong thing.

But do you think people like OBL or other terrorists genuinely think you and I are evil?

I have a hard time believing that....I don't feel very evil!

 

[Artevelde]

Because we want to make our own excuses and reasons for their actions, there is, unfortunately and disastroously, no way we can defend outselves. We will always be fighting the wrong thing.

But do you think people like OBL or other terrorists genuinely think you and I are evil?

I have a hard time believing that....I don't feel very evil!

Jihadi terrorists believe all non-believers are evil. It's one of the things that sets them apart from other forms of terrorism.

 

[Saigon]

Art -

Yeah, I guess. But it's a difficult concept to really come to terms with, isn't it?

I know a lot of Jewish people struggle to understand the hatred the Nazis felt for them, and I feel the same when I think of Muslim terrorists hating me.

 

[Artevelde]

Art -

Yeah, I guess. But it's a difficult concept to really come to terms with, isn't it?

I know a lot of Jewish people struggle to understand the hatred the Nazis felt for them, and I feel the same when I think of Muslim terrorists hating me.

It's just a reality. Better deal with it. Hopefully in the next couple of decades we can kill off several hundreds of thosands of the jihadi terrorists and their supports and make the threat abate substantially.

 

[Saigon]

Arte -

I honestly hope not, because that would more likely mean world war than global peace.

I'd rather see the root causes for terror addressed than let the wound fester and spread.

The Irish conflict didn't end by killing all Catholics, and neither has genocide proved a solution anywhere else that I can think of.

 

[Sunni Man]

Jihadi terrorists believe all non-believers are evil. It's one of the things that sets them apart from other forms of terrorism.

Are your this dumb in real life; or just play idiot in the internet?

 

[Buford]

Jihadi terrorists believe all non-believers are evil. It's one of the things that sets them apart from other forms of terrorism.

Are your this dumb in real life; or just play idiot in the internet?

Are you an Islamist terrorist sympathizer in real life like you are on the internet?

 

[Sunni Man]

I'd rather see the root causes for terror addressed than let the wound fester and spread.

I totally agree with that.

 

[mudwhistle]

The only country I remember that appreciated what we did for them almost unanimously has been Kuwait.

I don't think that is true - I think most people in Europe (in particular countries like France, Holland etc) appreciate enormously the massive contribution made by the US in defeating Hitler.

I'd guess people in Libya are also fairly happy with the US help in getting their country back.

But in other instances, such as Somalia, the US have gone in with poor intelligence and a bad strategy, and that hasn't won too many hearts and minds.

Sure....it's our fault.

I was speaking mostly of Islamic countries.

Somalia is run by various clans. They don't like each other. We got in the middle of a civil war and stopped it. Once we stopped it the troubles started.

 

[High_Gravity]

Weakness. Moral, intellectual, and military weakness.

Is weakness related to poverty?

Not moraly, but certainly lower levels of education and less educational opportunities instill an element of weakness, no?

Well Unkotare has a point, if the people commiting terrorism had a capable Military fighting force there wouldn't be a need for IED's, suicide bombings etc etc

 

[High_Gravity]

The root cause of Terrorism depends on which Terrorist you are (specifically what drives your hatred), and who you interpret your enemies to be.

Fair enough - but you don't think those specific causes generally fall into typical patterns?

I'd say people feel hatred because they are poor, have no jobs, and People X, do have jobs.

I'd say people feel hatred because People X invaded their country, and they want payback. (Despite the fact the invasion was actually payback for a previous invasion in the other direction).

I'd say people feel hatred because they feel they are being held down or threatened inside their own country, often by some minority.

If poverty and no jobs is what makes terrorists we in the US are in trouble, we have alot of unemployed poor people here now.

 

[High_Gravity]

The only country I remember that appreciated what we did for them almost unanimously has been Kuwait.

I don't think that is true - I think most people in Europe (in particular countries like France, Holland etc) appreciate enormously the massive contribution made by the US in defeating Hitler.

I'd guess people in Libya are also fairly happy with the US help in getting their country back.

But in other instances, such as Somalia, the US have gone in with poor intelligence and a bad strategy, and that hasn't won too many hearts and minds.

Sure....it's our fault.

I was speaking mostly of Islamic countries.

Somalia is run by various clans. They don't like each other. We got in the middle of a civil war and stopped it. Once we stopped it the troubles started.

Kuwait was only grateful for a short while after we liberated them, most of them are now back to being anti American assholes.