Is Islam = Terrorism?

Is Terrorism = Islam? Of course not

It is easy to judge the terror attacks we have witnessed in Paris as a spin-off of radical islamism as all of the terrorists were muslims. I am writing this short article because I have worked with this subject for quite many years and I feel that it is more important now than ever before to think carefully what to do and who to blame.

A lot of politicians and political organisations have used the terror attacks to argue for tougher immigration laws in Europe and tougher control with muslims in Europe. For less intellligent (pardon my french) it seems like an obvious answer as all 3 terrorists were muslims. But what if all three were left-handed too? That would make me a potential terrorist too as I am left-handed.

My point is we are looking at the wrong factors when we are trying to explain what had happened over the past couple of days here in France. Islam is of course not the reason why these people became terrorists. They said they did it in the name of Allah, but when you look at their personal history of life you might find a more proper answer why their lifes ended this way.

Social inequality is one factor we on a global scale has to take more seriously. France is the country in Europe with the largest population of Muslims (and jews by the way) and the majority of the unemployed people are muslims and many of them are coming from troubled families either in France or countries in the middle east or Northern Africa. So when a few individuals in that group goes to the extreme is it fair to say the reason is their religion and not the experiences they have had in life? I don’t think so.

Is it fair that we demand the muslims to communities to condem the actions which just took place when we don’t demand the cristian church to condemn for instance the school shootings in USA or Anders Breiviks massive killings in Norway? I don’t think so. But if it is fair, then it will also be fair that the cristian church condems the attacks on a mosque in France today.

This is more likely to be true:

f(Social inequality)=terrorism

I believe

I believe that the best way to preserve democracy is to make sure that no one living in it want to trade it for anything else. Excluding or marginalising groups of people doesn’t promote that – it has been tried. Stereotyping just makes things a lot worse. Promoting simplistic views on a complex situation is stupid to a level that only some politicians pursue. Unfortunately these politicians get a lot of media attention.

I believe we have to become clear about what is required and expected from the individuals when living in a democracy. Instead of teaching religions in schools we should teach democracy and cultural intelligence.

I believe we have to make the gab smaller between the middleclass and the poorest people. We need to give the poorest people a better alternative to live and die for than a religious novel whether it is the bible, the koran or something else.

We have to to learn to embrace diversity and see the beauty in that we are all different. The reason why people go over the edge is NEVER a religious belief but merely the the last shout for help before they die.

Let us change it now. Let us educate those who try to divide us. Let us focus on what we have in common instead of how we are different.

If you start with yourself, then we are at least 2.