I think it might help to look at the question across a number of cultures, not just within the US which would have a bias towards samples belonging to ‘believer’ groups.

But sometimes what we do say are our motives really does coincide with our real motives, thank god! :-)

Best,
Clarice

“As for the suicide terrorism bit, it enabled me to see how personal despair, humiliation, hopelessness, — and end of real life on an individual level — is so unbearable that some prefer to swap their physical existence for a symbolic existence.”

Best,
Clarice

Neil

I will have to discuss this more fully possibly as late as next week (work commitments etc) — it’s a vital topic I think. It’s a truism that religious beliefs prompt evil as well as good, and I even think Richard Dawkins has a good point when he argues that there is far too much respect today for religious faith. (Check out the 26 November program here: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/backgroundbriefing/).

But the more I get to know personally Palestinians and Iraqis and Afghans and Iranians, both secular and moslem, (we have a fantastic activist network here and I work at probably one of the most internationally outreached universities in Australia) the more clear it is in my mind at least we would behave no differently under the daily humiliation and torment that many of these people face daily — regardless of religion.

I can’t help but think that much of the confusion in the general community arises from political and media propaganda, and a cultural tradition of “Orientalism” (c.f. Edward Said’s classic book).

Of course if a person is to act in a way that is normally seen in some way contrary to the tenets of his faith, then that person is going to have to work harder at promoting the religious rationalization for their act. And of course they will express their actions in religious terms at least as much as any other. I have little doubt that if the Australian aborigines or American Indians (or even people under the Roman imperial rule) had available the same explosives and other technologies as we know today some of their renowned suicide raids on whites would have been in the form of “suicide terrorism” — and the whites (or Romans) would have blamed the phenomenon even back then as much on their primitive religious beliefs (no doubt many would have spoken loudly of going to their gods) as on their barbarism. Few would have seen the problem in terms of white dehumanization and colonial oppression prompting inhuman retribution. And once someone did it once the “meme” would very likely have caught on and reproduced in the minds of many more.

The originators of modern suicide bombings, the Hezbollah, count among their martyrs the non-religious and secular as well as the devout. Many Palestinian moslem parents feel those in the Hamas wing responsible for recruiting suicide bombers are just using their kids and hate what they do in that respect, and it appears that many of those parents are more devout than those particular Hamas leaders who come across to them as more cynical despite their talk of religion.

But what turns so many people to behave so inhumanely and cynically? Why do they have such a ready pool of like-minded recruits? Another book I’ve discussed elsewhere helps answer that too: http://sweetreason.wordpress.com/2006/11/21/against-paranoid-nationalism-searching-for-hope-in-a-shrinking-society-ghassan-hage-pluto-press-2003-review/

But I began by saying I would not discuss this now (and have got carried away instead) — and i really must dash now…. Will have to get more in depth reviews of other books we’ve read on this up online too.

Cheers,
Neil

I want to better understand the relationship between ‘religious belief’ as a cause of suicide terrorism and ‘national identity humiliation.’ At the moment I view these as interrelated. You write:

“It is bad enough that he blames religion as the principle or fundamental root cause of suicide terrorism: he says it was religious belief, belief in a blissful life after death, that enabled the 9/11 hijackers to commit their atrocity.”

“Pape’s “Dying to Win” is a scholarly research work that amply demonstrates that suicide terrorism is a function of national identity humiliation brought about by foreign occupation and that perpetrators of this form of terrorism since the 1980’s have included both the religious and non-religious and secular, Christian and Buddhist as well as Moslem.”

US policies have offended and humiliated ‘both the religious and non-religious.’ So true. But, taking 9/11 as an example, do you think that specific individuals who commited suicide on 9/11 were dying for their countries willingly because they believed in a better afterlife?

I’m having a difficult time thinking this through and so I’ll wait to see what you say about this so far.

Best,
Clarice O’Callaghan