Understanding One Another
Terrorists Are Like Us
EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION
There is no ‘average terrorist.’ Research finds no consistent level of wealth, education, religiosity, trauma, or mental illness. Presenting Rutger Bregman’s Humankind: A Hopeful History, Doug follows the social ties inside terrorist cells — from brothers involved in the September 11 attacks to siblings linked to the 2015 Paris attacks. Ideology matters, but for many foot soldiers, friendship and belonging help make radicalization possible.
A Note on the Original Text
Doug’s writings are presented as originally written. Spelling, punctuation, and grammatical irregularities have been retained to preserve his words and the integrity of the original record.
ORIGINAL WRITING
The content in this post is based on the book Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman.
Stoic data scientists, ‘Sociologists have filled miles of Excel sheets with the personality traits of people who have blown themselves up, only to conclude that, empirically, there is no such thing as an ‘average terrorist.’ Terrorists span the spectrum from highly to hardly educated, from rich to poor, silly to serious, religious to godless. Few have mental illnesses, and traumatic childhoods also appear to be rare. After an act of terror the media often show the shocked response of neighbors, acquaintances and friends, who, when asked about the suicide bomber remember them as ‘friendly’ or a ‘nice guy.
If there is any one characteristic that terrorists share, say experts, is that they’re so easily swayed. Swayed by the opinions of other people. Swayed by authority. They yearn to be seen and want to do right by their families and friends. ‘Terrorists just don’t kill for a cause,’ one American anthropologist notes. ‘They kill and die for each other.’
By extension, terrorists also don’t radicalize on their own, but alongside friends and lovers. A large share of terrorist cells are quite literally ‘bands of brothers’; no fewer than four pairs of brothers were involved in the 2001 attacks on the Twin Towers, the 2013 Boston Marathon bombers were brothers, and so were Salah and Brahim Abdeslam, responsible for the Batasclan slaughter in Paris.
When terrorists strike, the news media focuses primarily on the sick ideology that supposedly fueled the attack. And, of course, ideology does matter. It mattered in Nazi Germany, and it certainly matters for the leaders of terrorist organizations like Al-Qaeda and Islamic State (IS), many of whom have been molded by a youth spent devouring books on radical Islam (such as Osama bin Laden, a known bookworm).
But research shows that for the foot soldiers of these organizations, ideology plays a remarkably small role. Take the thousands of Jihadists who set out for Syria in 2013 and 2014. Three-quarters were recruited by acquaintances and friends. Most, according to a leaked IS poll, scarcely knew the first thing about the Islamic faith. A few wisely bought Koran for Dummies just before their departure. For them, says a CIA officer, ‘Religion is an afterthought.’
The thing we need to understand is that most of these terrorist agents were not religious fanatics. They were the best of friends. Together, they felt part of something bigger, that their lives finally has meaning. At last they were authors of their own epic tale.