The belief may be mistaken but the need is always real.
Examples: Anti-Vaxxers’ protest - need for autonomy, for being heard.
“I'll make you all shut up and listen to me.” - is the strategy to meet the needs to matter, to feel heard, need for competency.
Explosives to the chest - need for autonomy (from occupation/apartheid/oppression), for understanding (“see how it feels for your people to die?!”), control (powerless to do anything except this),
breaking into the senate chamber - need for autonomy (“freedom”), to matter (“stolen elections”), agency (being able to change things)
In some cases the beliefs which caused these particular needs to arise can be manipulated (and were), and the strategies for meeting the needs are flawed (insurrection, boom best etc. ) but the needs are simple, universal and deeply human.
I can never condone terrorism but can understand the powerlessness and pain behind it, the lack of agency, and the need to matter and have a voice that drive some of its acts.
So stopping terrorism has to do with addressing oppression etc.
>> I can never condone terrorism but can understand the powerlessness and pain behind it, the lack of agency, and the need to matter and have a voice that drive some of its acts.
>> So stopping terrorism has to do with addressing oppression etc.
This sounds so much like my former teacher and mentor - who was also an erstwhile member of the weathermen in the 60s. I do think that addressing oppression is half of the problem. But if you consider the problem to be humans killing other humans while taking their own lives in service of a belief ("right" or not), then it really can't be addressed without also giving individual humans the sense that their own individuality is wonderful and unique and worth preserving, even in the face of oppression or injustice. It goes deeper than whether the belief is wrong or right. It requires a form of self-respect and respect for life that can't come from a group identity. That overrides group identity and comes to its own conclusions. That is the basis of morality - the decision to refuse a wrongful order. It requires an internal moral compass and a desire for self-preservation and a sense of one's own life being valuable. And that's something that no organization or ideology will ever try to inculcate in its disciples, and which can't be achieved by e.g. America addressing oppression.
Yes, suicide bombing is horrible and does not solve oppression.
And yes, I understand the needs for agency, for autonomy, and the feelings of powerlessness and frustration behind such outrageous, inhumane and fruitless acts. I am also informed about the extensive preparation and brainwashing that go into it which also meet the person’s need for belonging and to matter (announced as martyr in their community). (See Syriana for a depiction in film?)
But solving oppression and murder by state terrorism will likely reduce suicide bombings, too.
Examples: Anti-Vaxxers’ protest - need for autonomy, for being heard.
“I'll make you all shut up and listen to me.” - is the strategy to meet the needs to matter, to feel heard, need for competency.
Explosives to the chest - need for autonomy (from occupation/apartheid/oppression), for understanding (“see how it feels for your people to die?!”), control (powerless to do anything except this),
breaking into the senate chamber - need for autonomy (“freedom”), to matter (“stolen elections”), agency (being able to change things)
In some cases the beliefs which caused these particular needs to arise can be manipulated (and were), and the strategies for meeting the needs are flawed (insurrection, boom best etc. ) but the needs are simple, universal and deeply human.
I can never condone terrorism but can understand the powerlessness and pain behind it, the lack of agency, and the need to matter and have a voice that drive some of its acts.
So stopping terrorism has to do with addressing oppression etc.