Why do people become Islamic extremist?

[pr126]

Let me put it in capital letters for you:

THERE IS NO MODERATE ISLAM.

Islam is islam, they all read the same book! Please understand that.

Islam cannot be reformed.
I have said it in this thread that holy war (jihad) is the core teaching of Islam.

Besides, we cannot wait hundreds of years for Islam to "mellow".
Not with the WMDs available today.

Or do you think they, the "extremist" will just pack up their toys and go back to sleep?   
Not a chance.

You wrote:

Islam can be tempered down and changed, because it HAS been tempered down and changed.

Yes, you are right.   But Islam can be tempered down only by superior force.

See Kemal Ataturk, in Turkey, he did not use words like "please, if you don't mind".  No he used brutal force, executing clerics,  an iron fist to make it happen. Ended the Caliphate.

It has worked for a while. Now, Erdogan is reversing that process.
The Turkish Military has "cleaned out" Islamist take over a few times, but Erdogan has removed those officers since from the Army.

Anyhow, the only thing keeps Islam "docile" is superior force.
Nothing else works.

[Atheon]

Two words: North Korea. Pure brutality and fanaticism. Hell-bent on world domination, according to their doctrine of Juche, but thankfully severely lacking in resources.

Not an iota of Islam.

[Munch]

There are no moderate religions. There are only moderate people, who cherry pick the parts they want, or go by all the teachings.

[Atheon]

THERE IS NO MODERATE ISLAM.

Islam is islam, they all read the same book!

Yes, there is moderate Islam, and I know many moderate Muslims. I've met liberal Muslims who drink liquor and eat pork.

Yes, sure they read the same book, but like Christians, they interpret it in wildly different ways.

[Baruch]

pe126 - love your avatar/icon ... yes, political Islam today is another system of dictatorship (see Egypt).
Atheon - love your avatar/icon ... new, or am I senile?  Both?  Nous sommes d'accord?

The first problem is the deceit of words.  Islam, is it Prophet Muhammad?  Is it Caliph Umar?  Is it Caliph Ali?  In the first 100 years of desert revolution, it came in more than one form.  Under Caliph Umar in particular, it is just another imperialism.  Under Caliph Ali it is a monarchy.  Under Prophet Muhammad, it is Che Guevara on steroids.

I agree that notions of Islamic reform are questionable and unlikely.  Best to keep them at a distance (sorry Europe, but you have always been the front line, along with India).  And I agree that there are individual Muslims who are civilized.  Best to encourage them.  I prefer to be civilized, but if I were one of them, I would treat y'all as enemies to be killed, in a war that started at least as early as 634 under Caliph Umar.  Though this isn't technically in the Quran, it is justified by twisted quotes out of the Quran, same as others twist quotes out of the Bible.

But why no mention of the three elephants in the room ... that the US and Saudi Arabia have been in cahoots since 1944 ... and GB and Arab quislings since 1914 ... though both countries have been involved in war in the Middle East since the Napoleonic Wars, and the English relationship goes back to the Crusades (mostly Norman folks, not real English).  Modern Islamic extremism was encouraged and resisted by the Soviet Union, and encouraged resisted by the US.  In the Cold War the stakes were the survival of the world, with both sides willing to exterminate humanity ... what happened in the Middle East was only tactical ... though Israel has a lot to answer for as well.  In 1973 the world almost went mushroom cloud over the Yom Kippur war.  And the heightened tensions in Jerusalem/Hebron in 1984 nearly escalated as well.  The fact is, the US, Israel and Russia ... encourage militant Islam ... usually as Dark Ops.

[Mike Cl]

OK, I have watched the video in full.

My question still stand:

Why there are not equal numbers of "extremists" from other religious groups or from people with no religion?

Only Islam teaches world domination to it's adherents by warfare.

I wonder how this professor would explain the gang problem in this country?  Would those same points hold?  Are the young men in this country subverted into gangs using the same points, only with different names, as the religious extremists ?   One of the big reasons for gangs that I've noticed is a sense of belonging.  I would imagine that goes for the extremists as well. 

[Brian37]

I think humans make a huge mistake making things about labels instead of thinking in terms of human psychology that leads people to get violent for any reason.

Why did the Columbine killers do what they did? It was a cheap and horrible way of getting attention. The reasons for such can vary but still amounts to a disenfranchisement sense of not belonging and or lacking some sense of power in ones own life.

It amounts to acting out because of a psychological sense of expressing pain in your own life. Religious violence is simply a political justification for the same acting out.

The more humans seek to understand behavior, good or bad, as evolutionary, the more we can reduce the risk of violence done for any reason. When you act out in violence you are expressing your own insecurities in an attempt to fill that gap. It can be for any reason, personal or ideological or mental illness.

But as far as religion, any religion, I am talking about the idea itself as a human invented concept in our species history. Form several groups and there will be competition. Understand it in these terms you can see what is really going on. It is our tribal behavior in evolutionary terms. Sell that utopia to enough people in a climate where they feel disenfranchised, any individual of any religion, has the potential to act out in violence, and will do so unfortunately thinking they are a hero to their plight.

Religious tribalism is political, but people join religions and defend them for the same reasons someone might joint a street gang. The same reason people can worship nationalism, and or political parties.

[GSOgymrat]

I think humans make a huge mistake making things about labels instead of thinking in terms of human psychology that leads people to get violent for any reason.

Why did the Columbine killers do what they did? It was a cheap and horrible way of getting attention. The reasons for such can vary but still amounts to a disenfranchisement sense of not belonging and or lacking some sense of power in ones own life.

It amounts to acting out because of a psychological sense of expressing pain in your own life. Religious violence is simply a political justification for the same acting out.

The more humans seek to understand behavior, good or bad, as evolutionary, the more we can reduce the risk of violence done for any reason. When you act out in violence you are expressing your own insecurities in an attempt to fill that gap. It can be for any reason, personal or ideological or mental illness.

But as far as religion, any religion, I am talking about the idea itself as a human invented concept in our species history. Form several groups and there will be competition. Understand it in these terms you can see what is really going on. It is our tribal behavior in evolutionary terms. Sell that utopia to enough people in a climate where they feel disenfranchised, any individual of any religion, has the potential to act out in violence, and will do so unfortunately thinking they are a hero to their plight.

Religious tribalism is political, but people join religions and defend them for the same reasons someone might joint a street gang. The same reason people can worship nationalism, and or political parties.

I completely agree. With a lot of these conflicts and behaviors the details are different but broadly speaking the underlying psychology is the same.

[Draconic Aiur]

The crusades caused hell.

[Baruch]

Crusades ... massacres of Muslim and Jewish women and children ... and Coptic Christians in Egypt (they didn't speak the language).  At one point in Syria, cannibalism against one village.  We have forgotten, but the Syrians have not.  No different than during the Roman invasions.