Young people joining a violent group in a search for meaning

Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – as described by Emily Esfahani Smith in 2013 – shows that forty percent of Americans "either do not think their lives have a clear sense of purpose or are neutral about whether their lives have purpose." The government agency knows that a sense of purpose contributes to mental and physical welfare. Indeed, as Smith notes, in Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl's 1946 book Man's Search for Meaning, Frankl said that a sense of meaning in one's life enabled many to survive. In a forthcoming study by Roy Baumeister in the Journal of Positive Psychology, Smith said, "participants reported deriving meaning from giving a part of themselves away to others and making a sacrifice on behalf of the overall group." Furthermore, while happiness was found in the present moment, meaning was found in thinking about the past and the future. Thus, meaning is about transcendence, both of "the self" and "the present moment".

Paul Brandeis Raushenbush, reading analyses of the ISIS cult phenomenon such as that by Prof. John Esposito ("The Challenges of Defeating ISIS"), noted "the continued use of the word 'meaning,' and how a lack of a sense of meaning and purpose in life, coupled with the experience of alienation within one's society, has led to many young (mostly) men, to turn towards such deadly violence." He said that the long-term solution to violent religious movements is that everyone to be

"invested in reaching out to young people. We have to be available to listen to their concerns, empathize with their sense of alienation, and help them find constructive ways to engage societal injustice. It is all of our responsibility to empower this generation with the knowledge and support they need to find a meaningful life and a positive identity that they can embrace and be proud of.

ISIS and other radical groups are deadly serious about reaching out to young people with their skewed version of meaning that leads to death and destruction. Are we just as serious in reaching out to offer meaning that results in affirming life and creating a better world?"

It's not just boys, Lee Smith wrote, in an article that began:

"Teenage girls are the West’s center of gravity: Virtually all of Western pop culture, the key to our soft power, is tailored to the tastes of teenage girls....Indeed, Western civilization is a success largely insofar as it has made the world a safe place for teenage girls—to go to school, get a job, and decide who and when to marry, or if they want to marry. When teenage girls turn away from One Direction and embrace ISIS, it means the West is losing."

He cited a recently released Washington Institute for Near East Policy poll showing that Middle Easterners (e.g. Egyptians, Saudis, Lebanese) tended to have negative opinions of the Islamic State, whereas opinions were more favorable in the U.K. and in France, especially among people of college age. "Thousands of young European Muslims have already left the continent for the Middle East," he wrote, "to help the organization’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, build an authentic Islamic caliphate. Doubtless thousands more are on their way, to kill and die for an idea they believe in." Despite the Islamic State's ideals and practices being "exceedingly stupid and vicious," for these foreign fighters, "the idea of a caliphate, ripped from the pages of Muslim history, resonates with a kind of existential authenticity missing from the vast and drab European suburbs warehousing Muslim youth."

Furthermore, "many hundreds" of European women "have gone to Syria and Iraq to marry Islamic State fighters," because, in his analysis, "the West seems weak and unmanly and they pine for real men who are willing to kill and die for what they believe in." Europe has social and commercial prowess yet, he says, "has become incapable of endowing the lives of its citizens, Muslim or not, with meaning" and "is devoid of values worth living – or dying – for." In particular, he says, Europe and the United States behave in embarrassing ways when confronting Middle Eastern powers, sometimes appearing to "roll over and take it," suggesting that "we don’t really believe there’s anything worth fighting for."

For similar reasons, Robert Zaretsky and David Mikics criticized the Western use of the term "nihilist" to describe the Islamic State.

“'Nihilist' is almost precisely the wrong way to describe groups like ISIS. Not only does it fail to define the group’s worldview, but from their perspective, no word better defines the world of Western, enlightened, and liberal values – in a word, our world – than does 'nihilist.'”

The idea of nihilism – and the proper "just and considered" nonviolent response to it – was originally developed in the West, where it has been engaged by philosophers "for the past century and a half."

Nihilism was understood as "the conviction that no conviction – religious, metaphysical, or moral – was possible" and that the absence of religious guarantees means that we should focus on taking responsibility for our actions. Still, the human tendency is to "tend to cling to traditional beliefs for the comfort they offer" even though modernity has discredited many religious arguments and even though "existential religious thinkers like Soren Kierkegaard and Karl Barth have argued that any faith worthy of the name must co-exist with doubt and disillusion." The task is "to feel discomfited by and not indifferent to this abyss," the awareness that "that knowledge is elusive and truth nonexistent." It should spur us to action. We must recognize "that human nature and human knowledge are imperfect: We cannot win the war against injustice, but only achieve provisional victories."

By contrast, Zaretsky and Mikics explain, ISIS offers a "thrilling new belief system" that "recoils from such an encounter with doubt." For them, violence is an acceptable means to an idealistic end. So, it is inaccurate to label ISIS fighters as nihilists and to imply that the West should be in a philosophical war against nihilism.

"Nihilism is not the enemy – this is not a war of meaning versus meaninglessness – but, instead, it is a description of the human condition. Our real enemies are those who, afraid of this prospect, seize on brutality as a means to religious or ideological ends; our real friends are those who, recognizing this possibility, are willing to work together toward human solidarity and dignity on our shared earth."

Sources

"What is a good life?" Emily Esfahani Smith. First published in The Atlantic Magazine. Reprinted in The Week, Feb. 22, 2013. pp. 40-41.

“ISIS and the Crisis of Meaning.” Paul Brandeis Raushenbush. The Huffington Post. 8/28/2014.

"Why the Teenage Girls of Europe Are Joining ISIS: Because they want the same things that teenage boys want: a strong sense of meaning and purpose." Lee Smith. Tablet Magazine. October 22, 2014.

Is ISIS an army of nihilists? Just the opposite: How politicians’ favorite word for the jihadist group obscures what’s really at stake." Robert Zaretsky and David Mikics. Boston Globe, Aug. 31, 2014.

Image: "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil" by Lidia Kozenitzky, available from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Effib

The case for calling the enemy 'Daesh'

Isis is the Greek name of an ancient Egyptian fertility goddess. The Egyptians, who were the ones who actually worshipped her thousands of years ago, pronounced her name something like Aset, Ast, Iset, or Uset. Her Greek name has retained appeal, conveying exotic, earthy sexuality and strength. Thousands of women are named Isis, and many American businesses have branded themselves with her name. Dean Obeidallah reported: "According to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, more than 270 products or business names among active federal trademarks use 'ISIS.'"

There is competition for her name. Today, a terrorist group so extreme that even al-Qaeda disavows it is self-styling itself as a new state. Initially, it announced itself as the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham, which in English has the acronym "ISIS". The exact region of the imagined caliphate is still in dispute, but even when "al-Sham" is replaced with "Syria," the acronym remains intact. Major American media outlets including CNN, NBC, and NPR still use the name "ISIS". The Obama administration, however, now prefers the acronym "ISIL," standing for the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. Meanwhile, the group itself has decided not to geographically limit its aspirations, and now simply refers to itself as Islamic State (IS).

Despite its relatively sudden appearance, the extremely violent, repressive group is believed to have tens of thousands of fighters, and now that it has captured some oil facilities in northern Iraq and northern Syria, it is believed to have an income of $1 million per day.

France recently announced that they would call this group "Daesh." Zeba Khan (who writes on Twitter @zebakhan) argued in The Boston Globe that this was a sensible choice, since

"it spells out the acronym of the group’s full Arabic name, al-Dawla al-Islamiya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham. Yet, at the same time, 'Daesh' can also be understood as a play on words – and an insult. Depending on how it is conjugated in Arabic, it can mean anything from 'to trample down and crush' to 'a bigot who imposes his view on others.' Already, the group has reportedly threatened to cut out the tongues of anyone who uses the term."

That ought to settle the matter. "Daesh" is the name that protests the group's influence, denies them the dignity of naming themselves and the power to declare themselves a state, and reveals their powerlessness to carry out their threats against the speaker.

As Khan points out, violent movements on this scale must be defeated both militarily and intellectually. Identifying the right name may help win the war of ideas. Allowing people to choose their own name is a sign of respect, and, in this case, no respect is due to this organization.

On a related note: in the case of lone militants, who tend to be disorganized and ineffective, some have suggested that a simple insult, such as "nitwits," is sufficient.

Consider Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab – the Nigerian "Jockstrap Jihadist" who boarded a Detroit-bound jet in Amsterdam with a suicidal plan in his head and some explosives in his underwear. Although the media colored the incident as a sophisticated al-Qaeda plot, Abdulmutallab showed no great skill or cunning, and simple safeguards should have kept him off the plane in the first place. He was, after all, traveling without luggage, on a one-way ticket that he purchased with cash. All of this while being on a U.S. government watch list.

Fortunately, Abdulmutallab, a college-educated engineer, failed to detonate his underpants. ("The Case for Calling Them Nitwits." Daniel Byman and Christine Fair. The Atlantic. July/August 2010. p. 107.)

Isis image above: public domain, Wikimedia Commons.

Was the oil worth it? All the U.S. and the world got out of it was an emboldened Iran. "The U.S. military announced on Wednesday that it has completed the withdrawal of all American troops from Iraq, ending a 12-year mission to fight the Islamic State group." apnews.com/article/iraq...

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— Social Media Lab (@socialmedialab.ca) September 30, 2026 at 7:36 AM

US withdrawal from Iraq was scheduled a few years in advance. But with Iran hitting US bases there, and Iran-allied Iraqi militias launching drones at Saudi Arabia, the withdrawal looks—to everyone in the region, and the wider world—like the US under fire ceding more of the Middle East to Iran.

— Nicholas Grossman (@nicholasgrossman.bsky.social) September 30, 2026 at 7:56 AM

Why does the US control Iraq's oil revenues? Azhar Al-Rubaie, Middle East Eye, 21 September 2026