I was reading about the psychological profiling of suicide bombers. Ariel Merari and Marc Sageman are some of the researchers in this field. I was shocked to find that some of my beliefs were blown to pieces.
For instance, suicide bombers do not belong to any religious sects even though violence is carried out in the name of religion. They are not the ignorant and uneducated ones. They are not the psychotics who want to harm others for the sake of harming. They are not even the 'humiliated' ones who want to get revenge for their 'anger'. They are not brainwashed simple people who merely follow orders. They are not unmarried vagabonds; infact three fourths are married individuals with kids.
So who are they? Although, they do not have a clear psychological profile, they share one very common characteristics with all of us: our need of approval and meaning in our lives. We all have a drive to be part of something larger than ourselves, to see ourself as special, and to be part of a group whose well-being is more important to us than our own life. This need is typically met by 'small-group dynamics' , the term used by psychologists to explain this phenomenon.
In it's positive form, it is therefore seen in corporate world, where small groups achieve something extraordinary achievements ( I remember the book written by Tracy Kidder on the discovery of first mini computer). It is seen in wars when small group of soldiers launch almost impossible missions that no normal man can ever think of. Japan's suicidal missions in second world war is attributed to this phenomenon. But such small groups are also observed close in our society. Some of them direct people towards self service where young girls are married to God, some of them are driven to God's service by giving up everything, some of them drive towards a very narrow cause such as sport clubs!
But in its negative form, this small group dynamics can evolve unknowingly or get created by a zealot. When Spanish authorities put some of the 2004 conspirators on trial, they were found to be from neighborhood in Northern Morocco. Jim Jones example of Jonestown in California in 1970's is the example of a person who created such a community which resulted into a mass suicide.
Their favorite hangout is not mosque or church, but a cafe. They live in their parallel universe. They may watch Al Jazeera to find support of their beliefs. They marry one another sisters. Entry in this community may be easy, but remaining in the community is very very difficult.
The central feature of this small group is that they seal off the outside world. We normal individuals are always pulled by different opinions and directions of the world which prevent us from seeing things in unidimensional terms. These small groups, in contrast, are deprived from the signals of the outside world, either by design or accident. For them, their small world becomes their entire world. No opinion from outside world is tolerated !
Do terrorists come and find them? No, it is infact the other way around. They go and find terrorists to recruit themselves for a bigger cause !
I feel we need to make sense of such counter-intuitive observations because, if we do not do this consciously, our brain does this for us unconsciously. These unconscious conclusions unwittingly form our 'beliefs', which over a period of time help us take actions or prevents us in taking right actions ! If we do not engage actively in this sense-making, we also forego the opportunity to 'shape' our lives.
No comments:
Post a Comment