Terrorists

u've all heard abt the Bangalore engineer
who decided to bomb glasgow airport. by all accounts he was well educated, had always been well
provided for and was not part of any organized terrorist outfit. What then
drove him to become a suicide bomber? It was widely believed that the poor and unemployed
became suicide bombers. Obviously this was not applicable in his case. So what
do u all think were his motives? Was it because of the dictates of the religion
he followed or because of the way in which the followers of this religion are
being treated worldwide? What do u think will be the fallout of this incident?

In connection with the poor and unemployed becoming terrorists, Michael Moore makes an interesting observation in his book - Dude, Where's My Country?

He wonders that everybody calls Osama Bin Laden a "terrorist", "fundamentalist" or "extremist" but nobody calls him by his rightful title - multi millionaire.

Have you ever seen the headline - "Multimillionaire plots to blow up World Trade Centre" or "Multimillionire declares Jihad on America" ?

In any case it has always been noticed that movements based strictly on one particular ideology draw their ranks from the well to do, since such people join the movement not for money or for the essentials of life, but for the so-called "higher" purpose of sacrifice, glory and due to personal convictions. That is why almost all left-wing ideologues and leaders have themselves been from very privileged backgrounds, claiming to represent the voice of the poor and the deprived.

hello abhinav..welcome to C18..
well i think it just fundamentalism.Islam has nothing to do with it.Its wrong to brand every muslim as a terrorist..it is nowhere mentioned in Quran sharif(the holy book of muslims) to kill fellow humans

When did you last read the Quran ?

well..3-4 yrs ago

Ritwik wrote:

In connection with the poor and unemployed becoming terrorists

thats the point here. u must make a distinction between those who lead a terrorist outfit and the suicide bombers. it is usually the "poor and unemployed" who are suicide bombers. the leaders might be multi-millionaires but they are not the ones who actually carry out the attacks. but in this case the suicide bomber was farely well to do aswell.

I think every religion is equal..it is just fundamentalists who bring bad name to it

Pragya wrote:

I think every religion is equal..it is just fundamentalists who bring bad name to it

Pragya wrote:

well..3-4 yrs ago

The problem lies in the too literal interpretation of what so called "holy" books say.

That is the problem Islam or rather Islamic scholarship is facing at this time.

Even if the Quran says explicity "kill fellow humans" [and I am not saying it says anything of the sort], don't people have a rational sense of thinking of their own, to know that this would be wrong and even counterproductive ?

Religion should not try and intrude upon matters of everyday life. It could provide a broad direction to one's life, aspirations and goals, but must not explicity direct people on what to do and what not to do.

abhinavverma wrote:

Ritwik wrote:

In connection with the poor and unemployed becoming terrorists

thats the point here. u must make a distinction between those who lead a terrorist outfit and the suicide bombers. it is usually the "poor and unemployed" who are suicide bombers. the leaders might be multi-millionaires but they are not the ones who actually carry out the attacks. but in this case the suicide bomber was farely well to do aswell.

True.

In that case one must enter the difficult territory of telling people that regardless of whatever faith or belief system you subscribe to, violence is not the way of meeting one's political ends.

but that u cant preach. cause very often violence has helped people meet noble political ends

Then it comes to the old and impossible argument of means being more important or the ends ?

If violence allows one to meet noble political ends then what is the problem with terrorist violence ?

Just that it goes against your worldview?

One must have objective criterion of right and wrong. One cannot have right and wrong forms of violence. That is just plain flawed logic.

well..ritwik is always right8) ...

many people are religious but they forget they are wrong at times..utmost importance should be given to human beings not to any particular religion..

no ritwik. the distinction is that usually such violence is aimed at unjust rulers or armed forces whereas in the case of terrorist activity it is aimed at helpless civilians and there lies the problem. and just because the logic is not apparent to u dosent mean its flawed.

Lol.

The definition of terrorist violence is not clear to you. Indira Gandhi was not exactly an "innocent civilian" but she also died at the hands of terrorists. Terrorists are simply non state actors who indulge in violence to advance their political aims.

Usually terrorist attacks are aimed not at civilians but at symbols of an order they think is unjust [quite similar to the unjust rulers you mention]. So they would attack the World Trade Centre or Pentagon as symbols of American economic and military might. They are not targetting nameless citizens per se, but equally they do not care about anybody who might come in the way. Civilians getting killed also suits them because people get sufficiently "torrorised", which is the very aim of terrorist activity.

If your version of "logic" [which it seems is apparent only to you, almost as part of a divine revelation] is extended, then as long as "innocent civilians" are not being targetted, terrorist violence is not terrorist violence at all, and hence it may be "good" violence.

The discussion was
never abt good violence or bad violence. The question is what drove an ordinary
citizen like u or me to such a desperate act. Ur digression abt indra and her assassination has noting
to do with it. Nor can anyone claim that the Glasgow airport was a symbol of british might. The idea was
probably just to kill as many non-believers as possible. That’s y u can support
certain forms of violence and still be against this type of terrorism. But that’s
still not the topic. What do u think drove this individual per se to act in
this fashion? Please don’t bring in sweeping generalizations which lead nowhere.

abhinavverma wrote:

The discussion was
never abt good violence or bad violence. The question is what drove an ordinary
citizen like u or me to such a desperate act.

To answer that question one needs to look at issues connected to it. Religion [and its interpretation], violence and logic are all issues connected to your question.

You or I can only discuss general cases, if you are looking for the particular story [with all the personal effects] of Mohammad Haneef or Kafeel I suggest you subject them to narco analysis.

ritwik dont dismiss a line of thought just
because u dont like it. u dont have to go for narco analysis to discuss what
could have driven this person. u can have an opinion abt it by seeing the world
arnd u and looking at peoples attitudes. it just has very little to do with
indira’s assassination and we must guard against getting trapped in semantics.

"A look at virtually all the older forms of violent (political?) activity — be it the bombings by believers in the Aum Shinrikyo cult in Japan in the 1990s or the Russian anarchists of the 19th century — has led to the conclusion that terror has always been a largely ‘bourgeois’ enterprise. Perpetrators of hate need technology to inflict violence of a scale to make an impact and the training to do so is available in modern institutes and through modern technical programmes."
"An analysis by Marc Sageman (Understanding Terrorist Networks) concluded in 2004 that it was not the madrassas that were closely correlated with terrorists or terror, but modern western institutes where students from abroad can end up turning to militant Islam as a way to counter the alienation they experience."
"Modernity’ in our societies is now limited to acquiring degrees and is just a way of enslaving one to the fruits of technology without imbibing the spirit that is central to ‘modernity’ — acknowledging the right of all citizens on this planet to co-exist as equals. Until this remains so, the same technology will also lend itself to others who are not a part of the genuine modernity project — to spread hatred."

-Seema Chishti
The Indian Express
July11, 2007
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/204482.html

I think this answers abhinav's questions substantially. although i have quoted the more relevant parts, go through the complete article for a deeper understanding.

2 directly attack the question posed by abhinav...we need to look into the subtle and not so subtle alienation of muslims in india....

while it may not b a conscious decision on our parts there is a considerably less proportion of muslims in our friend circles

whether we may admit it or not many of us have parents and/or relatives that in some way or the other atleast caution us against associating with "those kattars"

u will rarely find a muslim family living in a neighbourhood with other hindu families...muslim families usually live in groups...these areas are relatively less developed than other areas of the city...compare even areas like mayur vihar or pandav nagar to areas like zakir nagar or batla house in Delhi....the water, sewage, electricity conditions are definitely worse

a muslim in india inevitably finds it harder to find residence or a job both due to the inherent suspicion against them

all of the above contribute in some way or the other to the increasing muslim alienation....i am a student of jamia milia islamia and most of my classmates are in fact muslims...in our daily interactions there is nothing that indicates that there is a discord or alienation...we are like normal pals...but wen we go home are at 2 opposite ends of a discriminatory spectrum...

this plays on the mind of the muslim youth...even when he has had the best of education and has acquired a good job he has done this after going through years of discrimination and other subtle reminders that he is a muslim and thus- different...

this is ofcourse an entirely subjective point of u...i have no sources nor texts to back this up...if i offend any of u in any way or seem to b entirely on the wrong track i apologise in advance...all corrections would b welcome

i should also add a disclaimer that i in no way am saying that all muslims are terrorists or vice versa...but since the glasgow bomber was an indian muslim i have put forth the above points....for example when looking into the motives of an educated north-east indian getting into insurgency the entire discussion will be different of course

Um, all i hafta say is fanatism is on the rise.....and fanatics DO interpret things they wanna.....forget the banglore engineer, did you hear about the 14 yr old suicide bomber in afghanistan?

and since wen did suicide bombers become just muslims....anyone remember the LTTE killing rajiv gandhi?

Abhinav..now dude..chillax..Haneef is now free..he is not a terrorist.he was victimised.terrorism is a part of fanaticism not Islam.get your facts checked.