Heh, it’s a bit more complex than that. There are studies showing that engineers are dramatically over represented among terrorists (especially bomb makers) but the rank and file are dumb and educated.
Most of the terrorists in the latest spate of attacks in Europe are Arab ghetto born-and-raised former small time drug dealers and petty thieves who could barely write their own name.
On a side note, that’s the general problem in the Muslim world - all Muslim nations translate and publish as much books as Spain proper and there is virtually no critical thinking present.
In Saudi Arabia the curriculum revolves around basic algebra (addition, substraction) and the Quran. In you feel like losing some IQ points search youtube for Saudi preachers with their “brilliant” theories about flat earth, earth that stands still etc.
Situation is no better in other Arab countries. Mind you, Iranians are smart. Especially the women - really, really smart.
I agree. But I think education is at best an ‘also ran’ as far as a fundamental cause for radicalism goes. It strikes me as roughly the same as saying "we need to tell them ‘violence is not the answer’ " kind of thing. Well intentioned but unlikely to fix anything until the countries become not-shitholes in the first place. I’m not quite set in stone, I need to think about this some more. However while a catalyst and complicating factor I just don’t feel the same as the Myth does in that educating the populace will fix all this. Besides which, that education is a very long process. Very long for an entire region of the world.
Should we be able to somehow wave a magic wand and instantly educate all the populace of the ME to the common level of the US or UK, I do believe things would become much easier to address. Unfortunately I don’t think that education is the taproot.
Educating people out of radicalism is not working, not sure where you got lost, but ok.
The change has to come from within. Whether they get a good education or they get to read “God is not Great” or the “God Delusion” isn’t going to make a dent in radicalization. The problem started from within and can only be solved from within. It’s a cultural revolution they need, not education.
They need to understand that you cannot kill because somebody mocks the prophet. You cannot kill because someone is gay, you cannot kill because they leave the faith, they cannot subjugate women ‘cause mohomed did it and thought it was cool so it must be ok’, they cannot kill people in their family because of “honor”, they cannot kill because someone wrote a book they don’t like, they cannot kill because someone drew a picture, etc.
They cannot believe they are better than everybody else anymore, they cannot believe that the world must be subject to islam and therefore muslims. That’s a hard sell to somebody who has believed all their life that they are superior because of their islamism.
It’s not an education problem, it’s an ego problem.
We in the west can shatter their precious ego, but we cannot change that belief. All of it stems from a belief that God likes them better than everybody else and hence we are all ‘pigs and dogs’ in there eyes. This is not a product of rational thought, hence rational thought will not change it.
Then see [quote=“The_Myth, post:117, topic:219500”]
and this allows them to take advantage of the less educated and that is the problem, as I see it -or at least one of them.
If we can educate the lesser educated to think critically, they will recognize that the leaders are taking advantage of them.
[/quote]
How can you then say this
Followed by [quote=“Californiagrown, post:123, topic:219500, full:true”]
So many of the terrorists are educated? What? You mean the high leaders are educated. The front line soldiers and civilian supporters sure as shit are not haha.
[/quote]
and
and continue to claim [quote=“pat, post:126, topic:219500”]
Educating people out of radicalism is not working, not sure where you got lost, but ok.
[/quote]
And have you claim that I am the one that got lost?
I already unpacked that for you. It does not come from reason and will not be conquered by reason. That’s not much more reasonable that saying “Well if everybody thought like me, the world would be a better place.” If reason were anywhere in their lexicon, we would not be having this problem in the first place. This is a cultural problem. Education implies a reasoned approach. Yet, many are educated and are not anywhere reasonable.
That’s not isolated to them. Many people who believe to be ‘reasonable’ and ‘critical thinkers’ are infact more informed by their emotions.
Actually, the whole “education will fix the ills of our society” experiment already happened with disastrous results.
Immediately after decolonization in the 60ies many newly formed sub-Saharan and central African countries decided that the root of all their problems was the lack of education - so they continued the post WW2 “enlightened” policy of their former colonial masters and invested heavily from their meager budgets into education, building elementary, secondary and vocational schools, even universities and embarked on a program of sending their best and brightest to study in Europe, USA and the USSR. As a result, literacy rates skyrocketed, school enrollment dramatically increased…and that’s pretty much it.
No discernible effect on the economy, their countries remained literal hellholes and civil strife, ethnic and tribal wars and the occasional genocide continued unabated. For every illiterate imbecile like Idi Amin or Macias Nguema (one of the lesser known massive lunatics, worth googling) there came a respected London physician like dr. Hastings Banda or a world renowned authority on french grammar like Leopold Senghor whose education didn’t impede them in establishing more or less bloody dictatorships.
So no, education is not the answer.
Another factor is that the ME is a dog-eat-dog world and there is no place for nuances and niceties, especially in times of war - you have to stick with your tribe and coreligionists or you’ll end up dead sooner than you think. If you’re sunni and your side is currently run by a nihilistic death cult… well, it sucks to be you.
Also, from a terrorism perspective, illiterate sunni goat herders from southern Iraq who joined opportunistically joined ISIS to rape, pillage and keep sex slaves aren’t a problem - it’s the first, second and third generation Arab immigrants in Europe. There is reason all signs in stores in cities under ISIS control in Iraq are in French and Dutch, not Arabic.
This is the problem - European citizens. Most of the recent terrorists were either Euro nationals or had a dual nationality (and were to a man by all accounts dumb as a bunch of rocks), a history of petty crime and drug dealing and hailed from ghetto-like suburbs of major urban centers.
“Nuking the ME” would remove the proverbial illiterate goat herder I mentioned before but wouldn’t address thousands upon thousands losers living in crumbling projects, just waiting to hear it’s not their fault but the “crusaders”.
The problem is Saudi Arabia and its funding of radical preaches and indoctrination centers posing as mosques, but no one from the political class in Europe and the US dares to mention it.
Everything else is just window dressing. The solution lies in Riyadh.
This hits the nail right on the head. The problem started in Saudi Arabia and the solution can only come from Saudi Arabia. They are the only ones who could take on reform and make it take in the region. Now, the chances of that are so slim, I cannot think of a metaphor to describe it’s thinness. ISIS are just wahhabists who call themselves ISIS.