Here's two articles which are making some effort to getting at those root causes:<<<
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That might require a creative interpretation of the terms root and causes. Both authors show a nice way with the written words. This does not, however, mask their own ideological biases. Teju should stick to novels!
And again, you’re lumping all French Muslims with the individuals actually involved in the murders. Are you saying ALL or most French Muslims are affiliated with or sympathetic with Al Qaeda or other terrorist groups?
If we take out the specific religion and ethnic identifiers and examine its essential framework, the essence is almost identical to the ideology of some aggressive nationalist oriented groups and led societies who wanted revenge for past humiliations and had the means/actual will to accomplish them.
For instance, the Nazis came to power by playing to and further promoting the grievance at having been “humiliated” and “stabbed in the back” by the victorious WWI allies, democratic oriented politicians/activists, and outsider groups in their own society and across Europe they most favored as scapegoats for their perceived humiliation…the Jewish community. They were humiliated by the harsh conditions of the Versailles treaty which imposed harsh economic conditions which played a part in hyperinflation in the first years of the Weimar Republic, territorial losses on perceived core German territories like the Polish Corridor taken from East Prussia, the dramatic shrinking of the Army much beloved by right-wing German nationalists, and having some core German lands with vital natural resources like the Saarland militarily occupied by its historical enemy, France.
The Nazis didn’t even have to create this ideology of grievance…it was already popular and widespread among many right-wing Germans and others who felt Germany was wronged and must be avenged for it. They were the most successful, however, at harnessing this feeling…which they wholeheartedly shared to eventually mobilize enough support for their rise to power in Germany to the horror of its victims and the rest of the world.
And their avenging efforts resulted in the conquest and 4+ year occupation of its hated enemy France along with most parts of Europe not allied as independent nations with them along with the imprisonment, enslavement, and genocide of millions of Jewish people and other “sub-humans” they blamed for those humiliations and other problems.
This essence was also shared by the the Japanese militarist ideology promoted within Imperial Japan and its colonies during the '30s and '40s where it referenced humiliating slights it received from the West from Commodore Perry’s forcing Japan to open up at gunpoint in 1853, Western imposition of unequal treaties until the 1890s, and perceived unequal treatment at the Washington Naval Disarmament conference when Japan was allowed to keep 3 ships for every 5 Britain and US were allowed. The last was especially galling to them as not too long before, Japan was a close ally of Britain and fought on the Allied side during WWI.
This ideology of past grievances and how they were a “victim” of Western colonialists was turned into anti-colonialist propaganda to justify their colonial rampage under the “Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere”. Japan was the “big brother” to help its fellow Asian nations throw off the yoke of Western imperialism and colonialism…neverminding the fact they themselves were also active participants in the Western colonialist scramble for colonies from the 1890’s onward and their effects were far more gruesome and horrific due to their wartime atrocities and genocidal practices*.
**In short, this ideology you describe is not unique to Islam, but is also shared by many nationalistic ideologies. **
One very recent example of this is Serbia’s nationalistic myth justifying their atrocities and wars in the former Yugoslavia because of their long promoted legend of a great defeat and subjugation of their society in medieval times.
Vladimir Putin is also using this very canard right now to rally his base and to explain the faltering economy due to falling oil prices and Western sanctions resulting from his annexation of the Crimea and support for Russian separatists in Ukraine.
^Likely inadvertent, but you do realize your two chief examples both came to a bad end and are yet still apologizing?
This deserves a second posting, IMO:
If past experience is any indication, this would save a grievous amount of pain&loss.
This jihadist ideology is a metastasizing cancer
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-30761963
You’re missing one critical difference,
All the examples I cited are ideologies which controlled and directed once/current sovereign nation-states. Also, in the case of Germany, one can make a reasonable case that the Nazis had an elected mandate considering they got the most votes in the last free election of the Weimar Republic. And that’s not including the votes of the German National People’s Party(DNVP), a party which shares much of the same aggressive militaristic extreme right-wing German nationalist ideology.
Nation-states are a much more distinct cohesive entity than a religion which not only spans multiple nations and continents, but is also divided based on differing cultural sects and cultural influences from their respective regional/national cultures or international terrorist groups which aren’t confined to one nation-state or even respect national borders/nation-state sovereignty as this terrorist attack has shown.
For instance, wouldn’t be absurd to make the same assumptions about all Christians based on the actions of a small group who may not be of the same sect(Catholic, Protestant, Nestorian, etc) or nationality?
Such as terrorist groups which based critical parts of its core ideology on Protestant Christianity such as the Ku Klux Klan or much more recently, all Christians for the actions of a few American Protestants who lobbied the Ugandan government to pass draconian anti-GBLT laws with punishments including death?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/04/world/africa/04uganda.html
No, I read the disclaimer…
… and decided you’d scrubbed out, along with the religion/ethnic identifiers, any claim to any similarity to the Islamic terrorism problem.
No bounds, no rules, your critical difference doesn’t really apply.
Also, in Japan’s case, their government still has serious issues acknowledging Imperial Japan’s colonialist/militarist legacy.
For starters, current Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has praised the 14 Class-A War criminals while visiting Yasukuni. A shrine which has become a rallying point for extreme right wing Japanese apologists for Japan’s colonial/militarist legacy:
http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/politics/AJ201408270054
and current Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso’s has defended Japan’s colonialist actions, proposed that Japan learn from the Nazis regarding how to go about reforming the Japanese Constitution, and has dodged questions about verified reports his family’s cement conglomerate used slave labor from colonized nations and Allied POWs during the war:
http://thediplomat.com/2013/08/taro-aso-on-japanese-constitutional-reform-learn-from-the-nazis/
Cobrat, this is culture war. It is not nationalistic. It does not matter that people have committed atrocities throughout history in the name of this or that religion or nation or ethnicity. This is people with a certain set of religious ideas, strongly influenced by ancient cultural values and practices, waging war against everyone else, INCLUDING co-religionists who do not conform to their ideas.
Not surprising, as I always considered that^ to be a basic tenet of socialism: Crime is not the criminals’ fault, it is society’s fault.
Arsonists hit the office of a German newspaper that published the Charlie Hedbo cartoons last night:http://www.latimes.com/world/europe/la-fg-arsonists-hit-german-paper-20150111-story.html
Interesting interview with R. Crumb, who has lived in France since 1991.
http://observer.com/2015/01/legendary-cartoonist-robert-crumb-on-the-massacre-in-paris/
Anyone watching the March For Unity in Paris? Quite moving. At least a million people and leaders from all over the world including many Arab states.
I don’t buy the ‘poverty causes terrorism’ excuse. Bin Ladin was from one of the wealthiest families in the world.
Just starting reading this thread, no shocker, @marie1234, that you would post your anti-Black stance, as you do in every thread. How in the world is Al Sharpton responsible for motivating crazies to shoot people?, smdh
I agree it is a culture war, but one shouldn’t single out a specific religion as shown by:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/02/us-india-bjp-idUSBRE8810BH20120902
violent incidents and threats not only perpetuated by officials and members of an extremists Hindu based political party…but also one which is powerful enough to be elected to control regional and national government. Incidentally, they are the current party in control of the Indian government. Also, the current PM was the head of Gujarat during the violent 2002 Gujarat riots which targeted Muslims and lasted several weeks and stated to a reporter his only regret was he didn’t handle the news media better.
We also can’t assume “culture war” means it excludes nationalist ideologies. Nationalist ideologies, after all, are derived and part of a given nation/society’s culture and often influences and is in turn, influenced by cultural influences from the society concerned.
Maybe extreme inequality is more poisonous than poverty itself.
@emilybee, I’m watching the Paris coverage. Very moving.
If poverty and inequality cause terrorism, then India would be a teeming mass of murder and mayhem. It has to be tied to an extreme ideology, imo. My impression of the poor in India was that they were happy and pleasant. Most likely due in part to their Hindu beliefs.
Poverty and hopelessness make people susceptible to radicalization but they don’t cause violence. And, the unwillingness to assimilate into the culture of a country you are living is usually a pretty good way to stay poor.
“Just starting reading this thread, no shocker, @marie1234, that you would post your anti-Black stance, as you do in every thread. How in the world is Al Sharpton responsible for motivating crazies to shoot people?, smdh”
Whoa there. I just saw this and there’s nothing anti-black about noticing that Mr. Sharpton’s inflammatory rhetoric has caused a few problems, lately. He is no less vitriolic than Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck was my point. Actually, he’s probably much worse and much more relevant in 2015.
India is a great example, but how about this for more expansive context - “If poverty and inequality cause terrorism then” 90% of the countries in the world “would be a teeming mass of murder and mayhem.”
Since that is not the case, then linking poverty and inequality to terrorism is really only a convenient way to justify a redistributionist ideology, not a mechanism or real attempt to change the incidence rate of terrorism.