Al-Qaeda recruits Western residents and recruits adolescents craving easy certainties
Evidence
Rather than engaging in nebulous negative sublimation — “Behold, Satan” — it would better behove the opponents of Islamist Terrorism to consider more carefully what is specific about it. As John Stevens noted over the weekend, the typical al-Qaeda terrorist is unlikely to have been parachuted in from an Afghan village. They are much more likely to have lived in the West, either as residents or as nationals. Their affiliation with al-Qaeda will, we can speculate, almost certainly serve the function of resolving a tension in themselves. Al-Qaeda recruit from schools and colleges because they are astute enough to recognise that male adolescence is a time of boiling confusion that craves easy certainties. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1437
Categorization
- QUESTION: Worth verifying whether 2000s-era claims about al-Qaeda’s Western recruitment profile still hold for later jihadi movements.
- XREF: connects to: Demonstrating destructive power attracts recruits to terrorist organizations; Terrorist groups recruit through family and intimate personal bonds that substitute for kin. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4111; Failed immigrant adaptation makes some vulnerable to jihadist recruitment (+2 more)
Broader Connections
- State-neglected Muslim youth adopt jihad as a noble global cause
#corroborates(0.82) — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 768 - Failed immigrant adaptation makes some vulnerable to jihadist recruitment
#corroborates(0.80) - Demonstrating destructive power attracts recruits to terrorist organizations
#complicates(0.75) - Terrorist groups recruit through family and intimate personal bonds that substitute for kin.
#expands(0.72) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4111