Are we as a free world, pushing our youth into idealism?

The thought of our youth contemplating joining ISIS is enough to send a chill up any parent’s spine. We see the young faces of these recruits and try desperately to rationalize such seemingly irrational behavior. Our government frantically tries to counteract by monitoring suspected extremist’s on-line activity, surveying their movements, seizing their passports, and demonizing their behavior; all in an effort to balance civil rights with safety. Even Islamic groups quickly distance themselves from such behavior and scramble to create their own campaign to identify and educate potential radicals.

So why would someone turn on the very country they were born in? Why would someone give up a free lifestyle, their rights, their family? Why would anyone want to harm a stranger, take an innocent life, or sacrifice their own life to support a religion that promotes love, peace, and safety in its very name? It seems too easy to simply credit the ISIS on-line propaganda campaign poisoning their minds with misinformed ideology about the Islamic religion. To most it may seem crazy and irrational, but obviously to anyone who buys into such extremism, it makes perfect sense. After all, our men and women in uniform willingly put their lives in harm’s way every day to protect our ideology, so the rationale itself is not that hard to comprehend. So for the sake of argument, let’s not assume they’re all crazy or that converting to Islam means you’re an extremist, which leaves the question; why would our youth ever be enticed to join ISIS?

There’s an argument that western society lacks morals, family values, and faith in God. We’ve certainly provided enough material to justify this point of view, and in all reality we can’t argue that all those things haven’t diminished over the years. ISIS has actually helped counter this argument for us by beheading non-combatants, massacring villages, raping women, and executing people with religious differences. Western society may allow people the freedom to be immoral and agnostic, but we also respect all religions and put a high value on life. Westerners may be disgusted with what they see at times, but they’re well aware that immorality, like extremism, gets all the press. Most westerners, like most Muslims here and abroad, are genuinely good people and it’s a pretty safe place to live. So again, for the sake of argument and despite all the noise, let’s eliminate lifestyle differences as a motivator.

I believe our youth are enticed by ISIS because they are desperate to be part of a cause, any cause, combined with the economic conditions. This isn’t a concept that’s new; during WWI following a recession, over 600,000 Canadians volunteered for service, some even lying their age to get in. By today’s standards, that’s the equivalent of over three million men and women. In WWII following the Great Depression about 40 percent of Canadian men between the ages of 18 and 45 enlisted (over a million); all willing to give their lives for a cause they believed in. So how does this compare today? Our youth are definitely feeling the pain of economic times, lack a sense of purpose, don’t feel they’re part of the solution, and know the future doesn’t look good. They pile up massive debt getting an education, spend much of their lives trying to pay it back, and have limited opportunities for high paying jobs to help them. Many highly educated grads end up working menial jobs, have little to spend, and live with their parents. We may think that coddling them is helping, but boys and girls eventually want to be men and women. ISIS can offer them this opportunity by simply making western society a common enemy and asking them to join their legion. They tell them how important they are to their cause, how righteous it is, how evil we are, and give them a way out of their parent’s basement. What they fail to say of course; is there is no re-set button like the one on their X-Box. Thankfully ISIS has only enticed a small portion of our youth, but even that’s too many. Unless we find a way to help our youth find a purpose, we’ll continue to risk losing some of them to the first cause they think will.