If you look at the power systems around the world, the prevailing mindset could be summed up as ‘I don’t care’. Facebook’s Zuckerberg famously advised his team to move fast and break things. Apple slows down the iPhones right around the time when the new one is about to be launched in order to boost sales by compelling consumers to switch to the latest model. Apple admitted to it because their mindset is no different.
One more example from the tech world before I jump to the political world. Elon Musk is all over the place. He manipulated the crypto market with his cryptic tweets about Dogecoin. He spits out ridiculous things all day long and sometimes late at night because his mindset is that I own Twitter and I can say whatever I want and I do not care.
The power systems around the world operate in the same way. Khashoggi was slaughtered. India went to kill a dissident on Canadian soil. A good part of the Indian diaspora in the United States are some of the most bizarre lunatics mankind has seen. Israel slaughtered countless civilians, attacked Iran, Syria, Lebanon and others.
The unconditional support given to Israel despite the slaughter of innocent children is sending a strong message to Israel of the unwavering American support but even a stronger message is sent to the world that the most powerful in the world do not care about the plight of the weak and poor, especially those whose miseries are caused by those very powerful people.
Al Qaeda was created by Dr Abdullah Azzam for the sake of educating the Muslims. But it was taken over by Osama Bin Laden for the purpose of violent Jihad with the help and support of the CIA. It all happened in Peshawar, not too far from where I went to get my graduate degree.
Al Qaeda became anti-US and declared a violent Jihad against America after the events in the 90s but it became successful in its recruitment because of the humiliation and alienation felt by young Muslims due to the American foreign policy especially in the Middle East. More precisely, the blind American support given to Israel.
That feeling of humiliation and alienation is not only more vivid today, the more important aspect of it is that it is felt more today due to the fact that we live in the age of social media. News gets seeped through social media even when the gatekeepers at the major news outlets do not cover it. People used to feel humiliated by the governments.
Today, they are feeling humiliated by the people. Most people do not believe that it is Netanyahu’s fault that Gaza’s children are massacred. They have seen the images of Israeli society putting their signatures over the missiles that flatten Gaza. They see through social media how a large chunk of the American people are anti-immigration and lend their voice to such policies that Trump wants to enact. It is no more between people of one nation versus the government of another.
The conflict is morphing into people versus people. This is the most democratic wave of conflict and the irony is that it’s happening in the age defined by the erosion of democracy.
When societies around the world see that power acts with impunity, then the most organic last resort is acts of terrorism. The Oklahoma bombing, the flying of the plane in the IRS building in Texas, USS Cole attack of 2000 off of the coast of Yemen, the attacks before that in Tanzania and Saudi Arabia, and then the 9/11 attacks had only one thing in common: the use of violence to fight against a power system, which they believed was acting with impunity and which did not care about the weak and the poor.
Acts of terror are blowback. I wouldn’t be surprised at the next phase of such blowback attacks and for them to be more violent. People focused too much on the effect after 9/11 attacks. I am highlighting the causes of the potential effects in future.
#dont #care #mindset #elite
