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> Why don't we say that gunmen attack Planned Parenthoods because of income inequality in the United States? I do. I think the Planned Parenthood shooting is

• jules 11y ago
  If it's income inequality, then why are most terrorists highly educated and relatively well off?
  • dragonwriter 11y ago
    > If it's income inequality, then why are most terrorists highly educated and relatively well off? As I understand it, Middle Eastern terrorists are disproportionately from the thin and relatively insecure middle class, neither the oligarchs nor the people at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder. I don't think this is at all inconsistent with income inequality being a major contributing factor, though its not as simple as personal poverty being a driving factor.
    • jules 11y ago
      At the very least that data does not really fit the theory. At some point you have to consider that when the facts do not fit the theory perhaps the theory is wrong, rather than to try to spin the facts in such a way that they fit the theory in a weird way. I think some people are too attached to a particular theory being true, rather than finding out the right theory.
      • dragonwriter 11y ago
        > At the very least that data does not really fit the theory. What theory? It certainly fits a theory: that insecurity (and, thus, plenty of downward mobility), limited upward mobility, and a steep drop to the bottom combine to provide a condition in which members of the middle class become more prone to reject the existing social order and adopt extreme alternatives that are offered.
        • jules 11y ago
          You see, that's precisely what's twisting the facts to fit the theory is like. If you have a theory that it's all because of income inequality, and then the facts are that it's not the poor who are terrorists, now you have to amend your theory that it's actually the moderately rich who are afraid of becoming poor. And that's why they go on suicide terrorist attacks?! If it was the poor who did the attacks then it would confirm the theory, but if it is not then that would also confirm the theory... Lets bring in some new facts: terrorists are disproportionately college educated. The 9/11 bombers were all college educated and some had PhD's from western universities. How will these facts be made to fit this theory? I'm sorry if I sound disparaging, but I've had this debate 50 times before, and the mental gymnastics to keep an incorrect theory alive are virtually impossible to penetrate to the point that I'm not even sure if there are any conceivable facts that would falsify that theory in the minds of those who believe in it.
          • dragonwriter 11y ago
            > You see, that's precisely what's twisting the facts to fit the theory is like. If you have a theory that it's all because of income inequality, and then the facts are that it's not the poor who are terrorists, now you have to amend your theory that it's actually the moderately rich who are afraid of becoming poor. The insecurities of the middle class and the direction they push hardest being a key factor in both revolutionary violence and support for tyrannical government (depending on whether the fear of the continuation of the current or the fear of its collapse dominates, which can vary for different members of the same middle class) isn't exactly a novel theory, even outside the specific case of middle eastern terrorism (in fact, the first time I seem to remember it is in the context of the 19th Century European revolutions.) > If you have a theory that it's all because of income inequality, and then the facts are that it's not the poor who are terrorists, now you have to amend your theory No, you don't, because the theory that "income inequality" is a contributing factor does not imply that the actors are "the poor". If you have a theory that their own poverty is the reason that individual terrorists become terrorists, you'd have to revise the theory, but that's not what the theory was to start with. > that it's actually the moderately rich who are afraid of becoming poor. And that's why they go on suicide terrorist attacks?! No, that economic insecurity combined with lack of upward mobility in the middle class leads to disillusionment with the existing order, desperation, and susceptibility to alternative worldviews to those supporting the existing order. Now, where on top of the economic conditions, you also have a situation where, due to a variety of factors (including attempts to repress alternative views to preserve the power and privilege of the existing elites) there aren't non-violent, non-radical groups that provide something that feels like a plausible alternative, those susceptible to alternative views are going to be, more than in other circumstances, drawn to violent, radical groups. > I'm sorry if I sound disparaging, but I've had this debate 50 times before, and the mental gymnastics to keep an incorrect theory alive are virtually impossible to penetrate to the point that I'm not even sure if there are any conceivable facts that would falsify that theory in the minds of those who believe in it. Facts that would falsify a theory of economic inequality contributing to terrorism would be statistics showing that, controlling for other factors that demonstrably contribute to terrorism, economic inequality has no correlation, or a negative correlation, to terrorism. The things you offer are facts that would falsify particular models of how economic inequality contributes to terrorism, but those particular models seem to be strawmen.
• Retra 11y ago
  "Ah, gee, I really hate Planned Parenthood, and it's a good thing they exist, because if they didn't I'd have just as much reason to shoot up a theater instead." Maybe crazy, uneducated people are shooting up places, but the places they shoot up are disproportionately the target of religious shaming, an activity with little rational basis or utility other than the spawning insular communities who willfully shun education and moderation.