The Poverty/Terrorism "Root Cause" Myth
Dean
Art Chrenkoff notes a recent in-depth study which punctures the "poverty is the root cause of terrorism" nonsense. Click here to read about it.
In a related note, Athena has a photo and story of another terrorist that dispels the whole "poverty is the root cause of terrorism" nonsense. Click here to view it.
Honestly, anyone spouting gibberish about poverty causing terrorism really ought to be called out as a bigot. I've known lots of poor people in my time, and I've never seen any evidence that being poor makes them violent killers.
In fact, if you look at terrorists, they usually have one thing in common. Whether it's an anarchist like Ted "Unabomber" Kaczynski, a communist like Che Guevara, or a religio-fascist like Osama bin Laden, all seem to share a common background:
They grew up as spoiled brats in very comfortable, pampered, well-off households.
There was a line in the Rodney Dangerfield movie Back to School which explains a lot of "revolutionary" thought; looking at a spike-haired, highly pierced student, Dangerfield opined "you look like you're still trying to piss off your parents." These sons (and, sometimes, daughters) of privilege who make up the bulk of the terrorists are, after all is said and done, just really mad at the sterile society they live in and are lashing out in the most self-regarding manner possible...even a suicide bomber is merely doing a "more purer than thou" act taken to exceptional extremes.
It is as if in reaction to the imperfections of society, some determine that they must find the perfect cause and pursue it with a fanaticism which admits no errors and must consume itself in blood. You and I and the rest of the normal world look at the imperfections and go, "heh, what ya gonna do?" and go on...people like the suicide bomber (or the Jacobins, the Bolsheviks, the Stormtroopers, etc) go "you must bend to my will!!!" And if the pieces don't all fit, they'll break off pieces until they do.
The bad news is that we can't really do anything to stop people from developing these lines of thought; even an attempt to proscribe the teaching of the hate-inspiring philosophies wouldn't work because idiocy can just be re-created from scratch. The only thing we can do, and we're doing it, is to try and set up social/political/economic systems which relegate these lunatics to the fever swamps.
So, I guess if we want to stop terrorism we need to stop buying oil from the Middle East and concentrate on using our own resources. Something George W. Bush wanted to do the day he stepped into office but had every enviomentalist nutbag in the nation screaming.
And then they go fill their SUV with premium knowing they scored one for mother nature.
Ugh... the whole situation stinks.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI