RADICALIZATION - ?

I reject the notion of “radicalization,” as though it were the result of some kind of external force foisted upon a person against their will or conscious decision.¹

In recent years this term has become a favorite in the media and among politicians. It is used to explain what has happened to, “good, middle class American kids” who turn from the values and culture they've been raised in to join militant groups here in the US or overseas. It is similarly used as the explanation for how young Middle Eastern men and women become jihadists, in some cases willing to give their own lives for their identified cause.

The story usually goes something like this. A young person is introduced to Islam (currently Islam seems to be the primary named source of this so-called radicalizing influence) through friends, reading, or by viewing sites on the internet. Next they begin frequenting a mosque where they come under the spell of a radical cleric. And the next thing we know, they've left their family and friends, and have turned up in some covert “terrorist” organization.

It is all made to sound as if somehow these young people have been duped by a power that is beyond their rational control or will. They've been led blindly astray by propaganda or seduced by the powerful charismatic skills of an unbalanced, dangerous leader. It is not something they choose but something that has happens to them. And thus the use of the term “radicalized.”

While acknowledging that there may be some cases of such power of mind and circumstance over will and choice, I would argue that this is the exception rather than the norm. Saying that people are “radicalized” suggests that they are some kind of automatons, unable to think or decide for themselves. It reveals a diminished sense of what it means to be human, conjuring that somehow we are easily fooled beyond our own ability to understand or choose – even to the extreme of unconsciously, unintentionally losing all that we have and know, and of risking our very lives.

Somehow, this understanding of what it means to be human rings hollow and false for me. I give human beings more credit. Starting from the view that humankind is created in the image of the divine I affirm that, at our core, humans think and feel and decide and make thoughtful choices. And sometimes those choices take us in directions quite different from what those around us may expect or consider acceptable. But that doesn't mean we've been duped.

Rather than accepting that people are “radicalized,” I propose an alternative view. Is it possible that in meeting new people, reading or learning about new things, people discover that the views and culture they have grown up in have somehow been less than fully accurate or honest? Is it possible that in encountering and exploring new realms they discover a bigger world, a bigger reality out there that they had not been aware of (or that perhaps had been hidden from them) before? Is it possible that they find that the sources they trusted and believed in – family, religious leaders, teachers, politicians – have actually, wittingly or unwittingly, kept them from knowing all that there is to know; that they had been fed a less than accurate or perhaps even false understanding of the world?

I remember in the 1980s hearing President Ronald Reagan assert categorically that the United States government was in no way involved in supporting rebels seeking to overthrow the government of Nicaragua, in Central America.² At the same time there were some so-called “radical” voices claiming significant US involvement with the rebels. So, who to believe? All that I had been taught and the majority culture around me said “the President.” Several years later though, the truth came out that in fact the Reagan administration had been deeply (and illegally) involved in supporting the rebel fighters.

During this same time period I read about how the United States has been involved many times in the internal affairs of Central American, Caribbean, and South American countries, not infrequently supporting the over-throw of democratically elected governments; serving the interests of the United States and of US businesses without regard for the often negative consequences visited on other nations. Argentinian theologian, Jose Miguez Bonino, describes these economic, political and military interventions of the United States as “neo-colonialism.”³

A more recent example is the urgency demanded by George W. Bush's administration in the invasion of Iraq, claiming that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. The invasion certainly demonstrated the tremendous destructive capability of the US military machine. But of course we now know that the reason given for the invasion was most likely a bald lie, fabricated to give credence for a war that lasted more than ten years, cost thousands of lives on both sides, that destroyed Iraq as a nation (witness the continue chaos there, even as I write), and that brought the US economy to the brink of collapse.

What I have learned from these experiences is that the world isn't always what I am told that it is, that I must question and explore and research and ponder to come to my own informed understandings and conclusions. And through this effort, my viewpoints and commitments have changed. Through learning and questioning and thinking I have come to conclusions and decisions that do not necessarily go along with the majority culture and expectations of those around me.

And so for many years now I have claimed the identity of radical. In the 1980s I considered joining rebels fighting the repressive military-led government in Salvador that was backed by the United States. But this was not because I had somehow been “radicalized” against my will. Rather, I had studied and reflected and questioned, and in the process I had discovered my own values and formed my own opinions about the true and the false, the right and the wrong in the world.

My views and values are informed by faith. I am called and I willingly confess that my primary allegiance is to the God witnessed to in the words of the Hebrew prophets and in the life of Jesus Christ. I am also formed on a deep personal level by listening to and seeking to stand hand-in-hand with the peoples at the margins - the silenced, rejected, discarded, invisible ones. I have learned that much of what I hear in the media and from politicians and even in our schools and churches in the United States is information that has already been “spun” for political and economic and ideological gain. I have learned that much of what we are told is only partly accurate, if not completely false. And so I have made a commitment to question, and to stay informed, to take stands, and to involve myself in activities that denounce injustice and that aim, with others, at creating a world of peace, deep human community, and justice. And if that means I must challenge and question the society and culture in which I live, so be it. This choice is not because I have been “radicalized,” but because as a full human being I have come to personal, conscious, thoughtful decisions.

And so when I hear the explanation that people taking critical, independent stands in our world today are doing so because they have been “radicalized” – I question the accuracy of the analysis. This word, it seems to me, is just one more attempt to keep us from seeing the world as it truly is. Instead of being “radicalized” against their awareness or will, I suspect that people may be fed up with the way things are, that they are fed up with the what is being done in so many places around the world in our name, and that they have come to a free and reasoned decision to think and to act differently; to act in ways that more honestly express their experience and values, ways that they hope will create a more just, peaceful and humane world.

1  This is probably one of the most radical postings to date in this blog. My purpose is not to encourage or condone violence but rather to challenge us to question how our world is framed and interpreted.
2  For more information see https://libcom.org/history/1970-1987-the-contra-war-in-nicaragua 2014-09-06
3  See his book Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation.