Normal

[poliphilo]

It seems like we now know who the bombers were.

No names have been released yet, but it seems like we're talking about four young men from West Yorkshire (just across the hills from here.

Friends and neighbours are saying the usual things. How they were quiet, religious, sports-loving, normal.....

A Member of the House of Lords was saying last night that no normal person could understand such depravity.

Don't give me that. Young people (young men in particular) are ignorant, suggestible and "ardent for some desperate glory". Here in Europe in the 20th century whole generations of young men marched off to perform unspeakable horrors and give their lives for a succession of gimcrack, intellectually contemptible ideologies- imperialism, fascism, national socialism, communism. They were fooled.

But willingly fooled.

I was a student radical. I was part of a gang that over-ran a building on campus and occupied it for a fortnight. I didn't understand the politics and had only the faintest idea what our aims were supposed to be; I was simply riding high on the glamour and excitement of it all. I don't suppose I'd have blown myself up for the cause, but then no-one was asking me to. If I'd have fallen into other hands, had another type of ideology pumped into me, who knows?

I wasn't particularly alienated. I just wanted to give myself to something bigger and (as I fantasised ) nobler than myself. I was crying out to be cannon fodder.

And for males in late adolescence, early adulthood, that's normal....

Comments

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

Don't give me that. Young people (young men in particular) are ignorant, suggestible and "ardent for some desperate glory". Here in Europe in the 20th century whole generations of young men marched off to perform unspeakable horrors and give their lives for a succession of gimcrack, intellectually contemptible ideologies- imperialism, fascism, national socialism, communism. They were fooled.

We've always wondered how Hitler came to power...you've described it so well here. People who say it 'can't happen to them' or 'it can't happen here' are wrong, of course. (this is where I could insert something about the re-election of the present administration here in THIS country, and how people follow blindly - not just young men, Tony, but otherwise intelligent people! But I won't do that. And no, I'm not comparing Hitler to anything in this country.)

The people you describe above are always the first to volunteer when there is a war declared (or undeclared, for that matter). And sometimes it seems, after seeing the atrocities in which they had a hand, they are willing to volunteer the next generation for the same thing.

I wish it was a simple as finding the four who may be responsible, in your country. but I hope the authorities are correct.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Hitler sold people a vision of national glory- and they bought it.

The majority are always willing to follow a leader who tells them the sort of things they want to hear.

It seems likely that the four bombers are dead. But it's more than likely that they were part of a network. The people (the older people almost certainly) who sent them out to die are going to be still around- still busily preaching and recruiting.

[aellia.livejournal.com]

Tony...I thorougly agree here.
I have a Pakistani friend on here,lives in London and she's feeling bad,may I show her this entry of yours?
Penny

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Of course you may...

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

Bravo, Tony! I had been thinking of my own theoretically-radical youth myself (we spent an afternoon "planning a bombing" in response to the Kent State killings but didn't actually get beyond suggesting a couple of targets before deciding to go off and do something else).

Did you catch Blair's "four point plan"? I posted about it over in my journal, especially how I feel about Points 3 and 4. I can see where they come more readily to mind in a country with a significant islamic (as opposed to islamicist) population but I'm chagrined that we haven't had, nor has it occurred to me to call for, such a significant emphasis on those point ourselves.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen the 4 point plan.

I'm going across to your journal to check it out now.

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

And that's why young males are always recruited.

There's a reprehensible ad on TV lately. It's a recruitment ad for the Army, aimed right at the most vulnerable segment of our population: poor Black males.

A son sits with his careworn mother. He says, tentatively, "Mom, now hear me out. I think I've found a way to go to college."

She gives him a long look. She's heard this before. "All right," she says wearily. "Let's hear it."

He shoves a brochure over to her.

"I can get a scholarship, and get trained, too," he says, and he's pleading with her.

She smiles tentatively. "Maybe so," she says.

--

The thing is, we're way down on recruitment here. Lately the effort has been to approach the home schooled high school kids.

And everybody will be going to Iraq, I suppose.

That young boy may get his scholarship, but first he must survive for three years. He didn't mention that part to his mother.

--

I heard about the bombers coming from North England and wondered if that might be near you.

So the suicide bombings have begun in Europe now. Next it will be the US, I guess.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

The thing is, we're way down on recruitment here. Lately the effort has been to approach the home schooled high school kids.

And everybody will be going to Iraq, I suppose.

That young boy may get his scholarship, but first he must survive for three years. He didn't mention that part to his mother.

I've seen that. And I"ve seen the one where the kid is talking to his father when he gets back and the father indicates that his son being in the Army had made him more of a man, one his father respects.

My dad is active in Veteran Affairs, and some of the stories about the kids coming BACK from fighting, come back to find they've lost their job, once they set foot back on this soil they no longer are entitled to medical care, because a good share of the fighting force is the National Guard.

Recruitment IS down. Oh....bah....this makes me so angry I know I'll say something foolish...

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Our recruiting ads are all about what action-packed fun it is in the army and how tough you have to be- marginally more honest, I suppose, but not much.

The bombers came from an area very like ours, with the same sort of ethnic mix.

[mummm.livejournal.com]

Please may I add you as a friend? I've seen you posting comments to jackiejj and you seem so nice and so interesting. I'm not sure that I am that interesting, but I am an art teacher in middle school if that is any sort of a positive attribute?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a very positive attribute.

I'm delighted to meet you- and will be friending you back.

[mummm.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much! :-)

[seaslug-of-doom.livejournal.com]

Even as a young man all I was ever motivated to do was write angry letters. Monty Python was my major influence back then, however.

oh yeah

[manfalling.livejournal.com]

oh yeah we're crying out to part of something. witness me at the moment, and the movie fight club. really really really wanna do something BIG.

so i can see that. just- not bombing stuff.

Re: oh yeah

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I wanted to be part of the revolution, then part of the church, then part of the New Age, then part of the Pagan revival........

Re: oh yeah

[manfalling.livejournal.com]

so now then, part of...?
u and ailz?
LJ?
anything bigger or is that all u need...?

just wrote long boring email about this very thing- then deleted it cos it ain't no different from the stuff we already talked about a zillion times. ho hum go figure.

Re: oh yeah

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Me & Ailz?

LJ?

Yes, that's big enough for me.