Darum ist der "Islamische Staat" so cool

Warum empfinden viel zu viele junge Männer Europas das Terrorregime des sogenannten "Islamischen Staats" (ISIS) als derart cool, dass sie sich ihm unbedingt anschließen möchten? Um diese bizarre Faszination zu ergründen, hat sich Simon Cottee für das linksliberale Magazin The Atlantic unter anderem das Blog des ISIS-Fangirls "Bint Emergent" angesehen:

Bint Emergent’s words, and especially her reflections on ISIS’s countercultural appeal to young people, are worth considering. "The bottom line," she asserts in one blog entry, "is that the Islamic State is the classic scifi underdog battling a seemingly all powerful Evil Empire America against impossible odds — and in the very best scifi tradition — they are winning." "Besides," she observes in another entry, "IS [Islamic State] has a bottomless youth recruitment pool for the next 35 years, and like IS says, the fighting has just begun. You Are Not Prepared."

(...) In a blog post titled "Embracing Apocalypse I: the Islamic State and the Prophetic Methodology," she expresses particular admiration for a black-and-white photo of an ISIS fighter on the streets of Kobani, Syria. He is nonchalantly holding a machine gun, with an arm raised triumphantly in the air. Behind him is a scene of utter devastation, in which orange flames — the only color in the photo — and thick smoke cascade from a truck and building. The fighter depicted is reportedly Abu Ahmad al-Tunisi. "This iconic photo," she writes, "distills the whole conflict into one image for me. To glory in apocalypse, to embrace it ..." It also distills a possible contradiction or discrepancy: Abu Ahmad al-Tunisi is wearing, in addition to a thick, righteous beard, what appear to be a pair of Nike trainers. Nike is a large American corporation, and the distinctive Nike swoosh is a symbol of American urban cool—or, at least, it used to be. Apocalypse, Bint Emergent goes on to say, unconvincingly, is "a wholly alien concept for the west." But the idea of the righteous, brand-wearing badass certainly isn’t.

(...) The cross-cultural appeal of this figure is hard to deny, as Richard E. Nisbett and Dov Cohen make clear in their study Culture of Honor: "The world over, men are sent out to sacrifice and to die, not for such purely instrumental purposes as deterrence; rather they are motivated by what they and the community expect good, honorable men to do." "There is," indeed, Nisbett and Cohen remark, "a romance and an allure to the Masai warrior, the Druze tribesman, the Sioux Indian, the Scottish chieftain ..."

(...) The bigger challenge — as Alberto Fernandez, the former coordinator of the U.S. State Department’s Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications, noted when I interviewed him earlier this year — is how to create a counter-narrative that is not merely negative but boldly affirmative, offering a vision that is just as exhilarating and seductive as that of jihadists. "The positive narrative," he said, "is always more powerful, especially if it involves dressing in black like a ninja, having a cool flag, being on television, and fighting for your people."

The problem for CVE is that in an ironic age in which few "grand narratives" remain, no one — except perhaps for the jihadists and their supporters — really knows what that narrative is anymore.

Man könnte sich in diesem Zusammenhang auch mal einen anderen Aspekt anschauen: Seit langen Jahren machen Jungenforscher darauf aufmerksam, dass heranwachsenden Jungen in unserer männerfeindlichen Gesellschaft kein Bild von gelungener, sozial akzeptierter und zugleich sexuell attraktiver Männlichkeit mehr gegeben wird. Politisch gilt Männlichkeit as fehlerhaft, und die wenigen Ausnahmen der feministisch sozialisierten Männer gelten für eine weit überwiegende Mehrheit der Bevölkerung als nicht attraktiv. Seit langen Jahren warnen Jungenforscher deshalb davor, dass sich Jungen ihre Vorbilder für Männlichkeit stattdessen in Action-Filmen und PC-Spielen suchen werden. Diese Warnungen wurden in aller Regel ignoriert. Jetzt zeigt sich, dass das politisch korrekte Bashing des Mannes in westlichen Gesellschaften zu einer noch viel übleren Entwicklung geführt hat: Nicht der Action-Filmheld, sondern der IS-Kämpfer ist für zu viele junge Leute jetzt das neue Männlichkeitsidol.