Terrorism, Love and Delusion

In this posting I want to examine terrorism. As a philosopher rather than a psychologist I won’t examine the means by which potential terrorists might become radicalised, instead I will examine one of the conditions which might make some people might susceptible to radicalisation. Terrorists are sometimes seen as idealists, albeit with warped ideals. I will argue that ideals are vital to us as persons and that if someone lacks ideals that this lack creates a condition in which she becomes susceptible to radicalisation.

Usually the ideals that are important to a terrorist are grand political ideals. I’m interested in the time before she acquires such grand ideals, I’m more interested in the mundane ideals that shape people’s everyday lives. I want to link ideals mundane or otherwise to what someone loves. I will assume, as Harry Frankfurt does, that someone who loves nothing at all has no ideals (1). An ideal is something someone finds hard to betray and as a result limits her will. Love also limits the will. Love need not be grand romantic love but can sometimes simply be seen as ‘caring about’ something in a way that limits the carer’s will. I would suggest if someone loves something this something forms a sort of ideal for her as she must try to ensure the thing she loves is benefited and not harmed. If this wasn’t so she would remain indifferent to her supposed beloved rather than loving it. It is impossible for someone to be indifferent to her ideals. However accepting the above doesn’t mean that ideals have to be grand ideals, indeed someone’s ideals can be quite modest.

I now want to argue that ideals, as defined by what we love above, are essential to us as persons. According to Frankfurt someone without ideals,

“can make whatever decision he likes and shape his will as he pleases. This does not mean that his will is free. It only means that his will is anarchic, moved by mere impulse and inclination. For a person without ideals, there are no volitional laws he has bound himself to respect and to which he unconditionally submits. He has no inviolable boundaries. Thus he is amorphous with no fixed shape or identity.” (2)

Let us accept that ideals are essential to us as persons and I would suggest that someone without ideals has a sense of simply being. I would further suggest that this sense of simply being, simply existing, is one that most people would find unbearable. According to Christine Korsgaard human beings by their very nature are condemned to choosing (3). Someone without ideals has no basis on which to choose and as Frankfurt points out is ruled by impulse and inclination. It seems the combination of the need to choose even if that choice is an unconscious one and the lack of a basis for that choice is what makes simply being, simply existing, unbearable.

If one accepts the above then the need to love something, have ideals, expresses a quite primitive urge for psychic survival. I would suggest that in some cases this need to love something creates the conditions which makes some people vulnerable to radicalisation. Of course this need to love something might be met in other ways, perhaps even perhaps in such mundane ways such as keeping a pet. However the young, perhaps especially young men, want to feel important and perhaps this feeling causes them to prefer grand rather than mundane means in order to satisfy this need. In some cases the combination of the need to love and feel important creates the conditions in which some people become especially vulnerable to radicalisation.

I now want to argue that choosing to be a terrorist in order to satisfy the primitive urge to love something is a form of self-delusion. It is a self-delusion due to the nature of love. Love is not simply a matter choosing to love. According to Frankfurt, “love is a concern for the well-being or flourishing of a beloved object – a concern that is more or less volitionally constrained so that it is not a matter of entirely free choice or under full voluntary control, and that is more or less disinterested.” (4) Now if we accept Frankfurt’s position then when someone chooses to become a terrorist in order to satisfy her urge to love something she is deluding herself for two reasons. Firstly, love is not a matter of choice and it is impossible for someone to choose to love in order to satisfy this need. Secondly she is not really choosing a cause because she cares passionately about it but rather she is choosing in order to satisfy her need to love something. She is choosing to relieve her unbearable feeling of just existing.

It might be objected that I am exaggerating the importance of the need to love and underestimating the need to feel important. I will now argue even if this is so, which I don’t accept, that some of the same considerations apply. To terrorists the feeling of importance is connected to violent action. Terrorists want to be considered as heroes by some people. I have previously defined a hero as someone who chooses to recognisably benefit someone else or society in ways most people could not, in addition her actions must be beyond the call of duty and must involve some real sacrifice on her part, see Hobbs and Heroes . Now what motivates a true hero is a need to benefit someone else or society, it is not to satisfy some need to be seen as a hero. Some who pushes someone into a river in order to rescue them certainly isn’t a hero. Someone might choose to become a hero but if the motivation for her actions is a desire to be a hero then she is deluding herself about her actions even if this desire is an unconscious one because no real sacrifice is involved. Indeed it is even possible to argue that someone who resists her desires to be seen as heroic might be better seen as a hero even if a minor one.

Let us accept that it is important to understand how people become radicalised and the conditions which make this radicalisation possible. One of the conditions which makes some people susceptible to radicalisation is a sense of simply being, simply existing, due to a lack of ideals. Other conditions may play a part but what might be done to alleviate this lack of ideals? Unfortunately there seem to no easy or quick solutions because real ideals must be acquired rather than given. In spite of these difficulties I will offer some rather tentative solutions. Firstly good parenting; good parenting should always involve love. Some deprived and inarticulate parents find it hard to give or to express their love even if they are excellent parents in other ways. Some parenting skills can be taught but loving can’t. It follows we should encourage social conditions conducive to the emergence of love. Perhaps also we should actively encourage policies that promote happiness, see action for happiness . Secondly education must be more broadly based. Education should not only be focussed on the skills valued by employers but also on the skills that help all pupils to flourish. For instance the skills needed in sport and music should not be considered to be on the educational periphery. Education should be broad enough so that all have the opportunity to acquire skills to enable them to be good at something rather just acquire skills that are good for employment. Even if terrorism can be defeated by other means or collapses due its inherently stupid doctrines the solutions outlined above would remain useful in building a more cohesive society. 

1. Harry Frankfurt, 1999, Necessity, Volition, and Love, Cambridge University Press, page 114.
2. Frankfurt, page 114.
3. Christine Korsgaard, 2009, Self-Constitution, Oxford University Press, page 1.
4. Frankfurt, page 165.