Oppression: The Root of Terrorism

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Jean Paul Sartre’s point regarding how oppression is “so tragic… that it forces the oppressed to adopt methods as brutal as those of their oppressors, in order to win their share of human freedom,” gets to the heart of the terrorism issue. Stern states in Terror in the Name of God, that “suffering can lead to sin.” While Allen in Terrorism in History states that, “the source of evil cannot be intentionality, but helplessness.” Both of these authors seem to come to the same conclusion that by being oppressed, people are more likely to take whatever action they can to get the job done in their desperation. Oppression has even managed to encourage citizens to take up arms to oust a regime or otherwise make changes to a government for hundreds of years. Yehuda uses examples of political assassinations being sometimes the only way for these fighters to “gain power, publicity and attention.”
Attention is at the core of terrorism due to its flashy nature. As the phrase goes, “if it bleeds, it leads.” Due to this …show more content…

This fact does not change no matter where one is, who is being oppressed or who is the oppressor. When cornered, people will lash out in an attempt to make any sort of change. If peaceful actions do the trick, then they may resort to that, but in some regimes, people may immediately jump to violence due to being surrounded by it, and will not stop until they have made the changes they wish to see. Thus, in 1962, the Algerians did not have to use violence in order to encourage the French to leave, but due to the violent situation they had found themselves in for so long, they saw it as the only option to get the job done. If they had sought a peaceful solution first, they may not have gotten a chance to try another

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