Are all terrorists beyond reform?

Although many people believe that all terrorists are radical, evil psychopathic sadists who join terrorism for the sole purposes of instilling fear, killing innocent people and advancing their sadistic evil agendas, that is not completely accurate. Not all terrorists are evil, psychopathic/sociopath sadists. It might make us feel better and justified to slap the sociopath or psychopath labels on each terrorist in an effort to make sense of the evil they unleash on all of us, but at the same time, let’s be thankful that they are not all beyond reach – as is the case with the psychopaths and sociopaths of the world. That means there is hope for change, and yes, quite possibly some semblance of peace. Yet, we must all be increasingly concerned about the future of terrorism, its implications and where we’ll end up if we do not do our individual part to help put a stop to this senseless violence and help in creating change.

If we don’t do our part to help put a stop to terrorism and the recruitment of terrorists right now by first taking strong stances for change and by next taking specific, calculated action against the spreading of hatred and segregation that is sweeping the world at an alarming pace in these particular times, then we may just lose this war against terrorism and the consequences of not having done our part to change the hearts that can be changed could very well lead to our extinction as a human species.

To put this into context – i.e. the ‘why not all terrorists are psychopaths’ and ‘how does knowing this benefit us’, let me first begin by describing how many terrorists are ‘made’ to provide you with a better understanding of how easily many ‘normal’ individuals do get  recruited (or willingly join) terrorist groups. As you read, ask yourself if you or someone you may know could find yourself so angry at the world that you could fall prey to a radical recruitment organization or whether you or someone you may know may actually be helping advance the cause of terrorism and hatred throughout the world. Terrible thought, isn’t it? Do read on.

Back in the 1960’s and 1970’s, scientific experiments were conducted using average people to determine if well-adjusted men and women had it in them to inflict pain and suffering on people with whom they had absolutely no grievances with. The “Milgram Experiment”, as it has come to be known is one of the most famous studies of obedience in psychology, carried out by a psychologist at Yale University, Stanley Milgram, in 1963. Milgram conducted experiments[1] focusing on the conflict between obedience to authority and personal conscience to determine if there could exist justifications for acts of genocide offered by those accused of such in World War II, and also during the Nuremberg War Criminal trials. The defenses being offered were often based on a simple "obedience" defense, i.e. “We were simply following orders from our superiors”.

The experiments began in July 1961 and Milgram selected participants for his experiment by newspaper advertising. The idea was to pair the participant with another individual and draw straws to determine who would get the role of ‘learner’ and who would become the ‘teacher’. The draw was fixed so that the participant would always be the teacher, and the learner (one of Milgram’s colleagues) would pretend to be a real participant. The “learner” was strapped to a chair with electrodes attached to him. After he was asked to memorize a list of word pairs provided to him by the "teacher", the teacher would test his learner by providing a word and asking his learner to recall its partner/pair from a list of four possible choices.

The teacher was told to administer an electric shock each time the learner made a mistake, increasing the level of shock each time an incorrect answer was given. There were 30 switches on the shock generator – a scale from 15 volts (slight shock) to 450 (danger – severe shock).

The learner purposefully provided mainly wrong answers and for each of these wrong answers the teacher was told to administer an electric shock. When the teacher refused to administer the shock, the experimenter gave a series of orders and prods to encourage their continuance. There were 4 prods and if one was not obeyed then the experimenter read out the next prod, and so on. The prods were simple:

Prod 1: “Please continue”.

Prod 2: “The experiment requires you to continue”.

Prod 3: “It is absolutely essential that you continue”.

Prod 4: “You have no other choice but to continue”.

The Results? Wait for it: 65% (two-thirds) of participants (the ‘teachers’) continued to the highest level of 450 volts! Enough to kill or severely injure. All the participants continued to the 300 volts scale. The Conclusion? Ordinary people are likely to follow orders given by an authority figure, even to the extent of killing innocent human beings. Obedience to authority is ingrained in us all by several factors: from the way we are raised to the laws that govern us. People tend to obey orders from other people when they recognize their authority as morally right and / or legally based. This response to legitimate authority is taught to us in a variety of circumstances, for example, family, school, workplace and the very laws that govern us.

Similarly, psychologist Philip Zimbardo conducted an experiment referred to as the “Stanford Prison Experiment” in which college students were assigned to play the part of prison guards who would humiliate and abuse other students (playing the part of prisoners). Alarmingly, the ‘guards’ followed their orders and the results support Milgram’s earlier experiments, which tells us that just about anyone under certain, specific circumstances is capable of inflicting pain on other individuals and perpetrating extreme acts of violence against others. And there you have it: it applies to terrorists as well. Not always the evil psychopaths we’d like to imagine them to be.

Let’s keep this in mind as we examine another piece of this complicated yet simple puzzle; a look at contributing factors that often draw average, well-adjusted people to join terrorism. That piece? A sense of belonging. We all need to feel accepted, wanted and appreciated. Without feeling welcomed or understood in one particular ‘tribe’, most people will look for another to join and become part of. Imagine social groups for instance. Smooth-talking, charismatic recruiters will often hook those standing on the sidelines looking for a place to belong by appealing to their need and sense of duty and belonging. History does repeat itself. It’s human nature. How many of us recall the horrors of Jim Jones and the Jonestown massacre? Or David Koresh in Waco Texas? Once an individual stops long enough to listen to any of these twisted ‘leaders’ and their messages, the hook can grab the inner flesh just deeply enough to pull them in to listen a little more. In the hands of talented recruiters who know how to seduce a potential recruit, that’s a dangerous door to step through and the hook can quickly sink deeper. Especially with young people who do not yet have the life experience we all so desperately need to make our way in this world. Why, you may ask, would anyone ever want to peek into such dark places? The answer lies in not feeling appreciated…feeling rejected by our fellow man…being targeted…being told to leave a country you were born in or worked hard to enter to feel ‘safe’, only to be told to go back home. Feeling segregated. Feeling alone. Made to feel you’re part of nothing. Feeling hated and listening to the hateful words of leaders and people of influence who hate just about everyone other than white coloured people.  

And once you’re angry enough, beaten and humiliated enough – you may just decide to fight back – or join a group to help you fight for the way you see your human rights to be – or at least listen to the lies told by the ‘other side’ because no one else around you is listening with anything but hatred and rejection. If someone feels marginalized enough, they may want to assert themselves to the point of retaliating against the bullies who made them feel that way to begin with. The many sad events that have plagued Paris over the years, as just one sad example, may well in some ways be attributed to how refugees were made to feel unwelcomed and segregated – the result being retaliation of the worst kind. Once an individual crosses over to another tribe, it’s not always because they have a personality defect. It may simply be that they’ve been ignored, humiliated and pushed long enough. From there, it’s not hard to imagine how they begin to adapt the ways of the group they’ve attached themselves to. It’s as simple as acclimatizing to its laws and mentality to prove themselves worthy of belonging. We are – or become – the company we keep, after all. But in order for this to take full root, scientists have suggested that what also needs to take place is an attachment to the said group, its members and beliefs and a detachment to anything outside that group. Clever recruiters and leaders have a way of doing just that by empowering their members, giving them not only a sense of belonging but a sense of self-empowerment as well as a sense of feeling that they are contributing to the greater cause of their tribe. Once complete attachment to the group and detachment to the outside world takes place, it’s not a hard step to make to willingly inflict pain or death on the outsiders – it’s just the way it is. Nothing personal – it’s war after all. Driven by group dynamics they have come to believe what they do is noble and just. Radicalization does not happen in a vacuum – there are many factors that come into play and step by step, left unchallenged, the end result creates the terrorists we have come to see today.

Islamophobia, segregation, hatred and racial/gender inequality - to name but a few - are all potential ignition switches to the downfall of humanity. Keep that in mind as I give you your call to action. What lies ahead needn’t be that hopeless. We CAN make a difference, as I explained in my Toronto TEDx talk in 2015.

So how do you make a difference? Can terrorists be stopped and hearts changed? Believing they can and choosing to embody the humanity I saw in the Middle East (yes, even in the terrorists among us) during my Peace Keeping mission just outside of Iraq is what saved my life one early spring morning. It was a terrorist after all that saved my life[2]. We must remember that emotion plays a huge role in each and every life, including those of the terrorists who are not yet beyond reach. If we begin to treat each other with the dignity and respect we all deserve, that may just be enough to make a difference to help save humanity. Let’s get to those who have not yet crossed the threshold into terrorism – those standing on the sidelines watching and deciding whether to join ‘the other side’. They’re far easier to reach then those who have crossed over. Having said that, let’s keep in mind that there is still hope to reach those who have already joined their ranks and turn them around. It comes down to how we appeal to the emotion and love that still exists in their hearts – in the hearts of most of humanity. For our purposes however, I believe that if we all become living examples of that humanity and hold our governments accountable to do the same, we will change and save the lives of many of our fellow men and quite possibly slow the recruitment numbers right down. Hope for peace and change.

On the flip side of that coin: what do we risk if we continue to see those who have stepped away from paths of righteousness as individuals without humanity and if we perpetuate the lack of humanity seen in so many places throughout the world? Here in Canada, we are blessed to have our rights and freedoms protected - but for some in our very country this is not always be the case. Many are made to feel unwelcomed and unneeded. Why do some of us so easily jump to conclusions or avoid interaction altogether with people who are different than us or choose to disengage and bury our heads because of something we have seen or heard in popular media? Why have our politicians and lawmakers enacted laws that take rights away from some groups and give them to others? Are we really ok with all this? Take a moment, think again: could a simple kind gesture or a smile help the recipient make a better choice? Our choices are simple in comparison to the choices that many are forced to make around the world and even here in this city, and I ask you: what are you doing to make their lives more bearable? That’s your call to action: say ‘no’ to hatred and the negative examples of all those whose minds are closed to understanding and working to build walls as opposed to bridges.

[1] https://www.simplypsychology.org/milgram.html

[2] TEDx Talk: Finding Humanity in Terrorism, Paul Nadeau, October 2015

TEDx Talk - Paul Nadeau