WHAT makes Kids from 90 countries Join ISIS? How about AMERICAN produced VIDEOS?

WHAT makes Kids from 90 countries Join ISIS? How about AMERICAN produced VIDEOS?

What force is ISIS/ISIL using that is sucking in kids from 90 countries around the world, including the U.S. and Europe?  Part of it could be due to their social media videos being produced by a U.S. person. Yep, an AMERICAN, with unique video editing skills not found in the Middle East could well be the key in making this sick bunch look like Hollywood.

This is apparently a “shock” to people. The sad truth is that professional video editing is likely the reason ISIS/ISIL has been successful sucking in innocent middle-class Muslim kids from around the world into its black hole of death. Estimates are that about 150-200 of them are from the U.S., 2,000 – 3,000 from Europe and the rest from other countries, making up about a total of 20,000 to 30,000 members (good enough to defeat a much larger Iraqi army.) That’s out of 1.5 BILLION Muslims worldwide (mathematically 30,000 of 1.5 billion is 0.002%!). So you can see why no President has framed this as a ‘war against Islam’ because that would be both wrong and nuts!

The ISIS/ISIL videos are not the boring ones that grandpa Osama bin laden did. Osama was like the YouTuber who thinks an hour of them yakking into a camera is exciting to see. I recall from my days doing television terrorism analysis that bin Laden’s videos mostly consisted of one guy (him) sitting with a rifle, blabbering for an hour! Just words and a stale presentation.  A couple shots of him firing an AK-47. No black uniforms. Definitely not an Oscar winner or nomination there.

ISIS is Osama 3.0 with modern Internet and Social Media fueling recruits. They show ACTION-- lots of U.S. style quick edits of reality TV-type people talking trash and doing stuff (like breaking 3,000 year old ancient artifacts recently -- using slow motion scenes of statues falling, accompanied by a singing soundtrack in Arabic in the background!

WHY do kids from Europe or the U.S. (or 90 other countries) go to ISIS? Is it just the slick videos that an American created?  Are they really aware of the hell hole they are stepping into? 

You have to know that fact in order to know how to address it. Then we know HOW to STOP it from taking more innocent youth into their dark, violent, intolerant world. It's a world where women are used as breeding stock, bought and traded like sex slaves. It's a world that hates every religion, even other Muslims! It kills Shia Muslims because even they are not "pure" enough. Christians are but one of many minority sects assaulted by this genocidal mob of ignorant men who act like a religious mafia. 

ISIS is insane level intolerance. It's  one step removed from what happens in Congress today. Congress isn't shooting anyone except from drones; Congress displays intolerance when it prefers to starve people to death by cutting food stamps or denying them medical care! lol.

Do these kids go to join ISIS because they have no job or self-esteem? 

Or because they were abused by police and the authorities like "Jihadi John" claims? If police can shoot minority kids like Michael Brown and countless others, could you see how they might be attracted to fight back via ISIS?

Or do these kids travel to Turkey in order to cross into Syria and its horrors chambers for something else? 

I have worked globally including the Middle East. I was treated with respect and I treated them with respect. I found people extraordinarily helpful and kind even when I couldn’t speak their language.   I have seen what being poor is like to self-esteem. I have seen prejudice against people because of their color or religion or sexual preferences. None of this is helpful.  

I think these kids go for some or all of the above reasons. If you can’t get into school in America or Europe, why not go where they give you a gun and you feel like a hero?  It’s not until they get there will they realize their cell phones are taken away and they become raw meat for the front lines and a pawn who can’t escape Pandora’s Box they just opened.

We must change our own thinking to address all of it to solve it.

Our youth need education opportunities and jobs. Adults need to leave the world a better place for them than we found it. 

We as individuals need to break out of our mental silos and–and our comfort zone—and get to know people of other cultures and religions that live in America. I found them to be people just like you and me when you finally break bread together over a meal and meet their families.  I wrote of these things in Better Times Ahead April Fool.  I never landed in a new country without having butterflies in my stomach. But every time it proved to be a rich and rewarding experience in what I saw and learned. Do some traveling!

Congress has been more interested in fueling political wars than creating jobs by rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and investing in leading this global, high tech 21^st century. They can’t even vote to FUND HOMELAND SECURITY department during all these new threats! If that isn’t an indictment of our own petty purists who put partisanship in front of American security, nothing is!

We people cannot wait on small-minded politicians to make it better. Start reaching out now…go to a new place to meet people--at a mosque or synagogue or a Hindu temple, whatever. America has many of each.

If you are Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, Atheist or Martian, embrace the interfaith groups. They are the bridge builders we need to live together. That act alone will make this a better world.

Michael Fjetland, BBA/JD

Global American Series

Author, Better TimesAhead April Fool

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