EasyNow
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Dear all, I wrote this piece on the spur of the moment so please forgive any small errors. I don't claim to be right and I don't claim to be scientifically irrefutable. This is just an hypothesis that I am putting forward and I wonder what other people's views / experiences are.
Everybody's depressed nowadays, right? Whether you take it seriously or not, modern medicine has proved beyond doubt that depression is not simply a mind-over-matter problem, it is a physiological ailment like high blood pressure or diabetes. As a doctor friend recently explained there are more people suffering from it than you may think.
In simple terms, Clinical Depression is where some people have a chemical or physical imbalance in their brains which makes them unable to overcome depressive episodes. For example, after a personal tragedy the brain experiences a change in its chemical/hormonal balance that leads to symptoms of depression, sadness, lethargy and de-motivation. A normal brain will re-balance itself within a couple of weeks and the symptoms will lighten. However, in those with CD the brain fails to correct itself, meaning they keep on suffering which often leads to suicidal urges.
Clinical depression is a major untreated problem in the Muslim world. For cultural reasons, Muslims and Asians in general often sweep this problem under the carpet - many are diagnosed by doctors like my friend but never return for treatment.
So what happens to these lost patients? They don't seem end up taking their own lives - suicide rates amongst Muslims is one of the lowest in the West. Something that can probably be attributed to Muslim people's hope in Allah's mercy along with a fear of punishment for the sin of suicide. Additionally, close family relationships and the shame associated with suicide also helps to control it.
So are we just cured by Islam? Unfortunately, it's not so simple and like any illness faith may help you cope with it but it isn't a cure. The outcome is that there are thousands of clinically depressed but frustrated people living amongst us. They are constantly depressed, they don't take treatment and they can't end their lives either. There must be an outlet then for these feelings right? From here, I think you can guess what my next conclusion is.
Whereas in the third world, poverty and illiteracy can be exploited to turn people into killers, it is a different story in the west. One of the Glasgow airport bombers was a doctor, the lead member of the 7/7 bombers was a family man with wife, child and a wonderful job working with children.
Why do educated people, with every opportunity in life, choose to give it all up for a faraway cause? What makes people put aside all the good things in their lives; their families, their friends and all the benefits that their parents struggled to come to the UK to provide them with?
You may argue that the prevalence of injustice in the world, the killing of Muslims and constant warfare leads some pious people unable to look away, so they dedicate their lives to fighting back. This may be true, there are many campaigners, ideologues, activists and leaders who have dedicated their lives to a cause and worked obsessively to achieve it.
But I am talking about the ones who are less constructive - the ones who go too far, the ones who sit at home researching bomb-making on the internet, the ones who stay up at 3am repeatedly watching videos of gruesome killings, the ones who are willing to kill and be killed at the earliest opportunity based on some internet sermons. These are the one who have a problem I think, they have a mental vulnerability perhaps?
On closer inspection, these people exhibit the exact symptoms of being clinically depressed:
Feeling hopeless and helpless, continuous low mood or sadness, feeling guilt-ridden, feeling irritable and intolerant of others, being unable to take interest in everyday things, not getting any enjoyment out of life.
Most importantly - they have suicidal tendencies and a desire to end it all.
These are the exact elements required to create a terrorist or a bomber. Perhaps, it should come as no surprise then that middle class or affluent, modern Muslims are some of the easiest to recruit into terror. Depression combined with a lack of direction, lack of a challenge and lack of purpose in life may be the major reasons young Muslims join extremist groups and start contributing to global terrorism.
Maybe we should all be a little more aware of those around us, our relatives and our close ones to ensure that their weaknesses are not abused by evil hands.
Everybody's depressed nowadays, right? Whether you take it seriously or not, modern medicine has proved beyond doubt that depression is not simply a mind-over-matter problem, it is a physiological ailment like high blood pressure or diabetes. As a doctor friend recently explained there are more people suffering from it than you may think.
In simple terms, Clinical Depression is where some people have a chemical or physical imbalance in their brains which makes them unable to overcome depressive episodes. For example, after a personal tragedy the brain experiences a change in its chemical/hormonal balance that leads to symptoms of depression, sadness, lethargy and de-motivation. A normal brain will re-balance itself within a couple of weeks and the symptoms will lighten. However, in those with CD the brain fails to correct itself, meaning they keep on suffering which often leads to suicidal urges.
Clinical depression is a major untreated problem in the Muslim world. For cultural reasons, Muslims and Asians in general often sweep this problem under the carpet - many are diagnosed by doctors like my friend but never return for treatment.
So what happens to these lost patients? They don't seem end up taking their own lives - suicide rates amongst Muslims is one of the lowest in the West. Something that can probably be attributed to Muslim people's hope in Allah's mercy along with a fear of punishment for the sin of suicide. Additionally, close family relationships and the shame associated with suicide also helps to control it.
So are we just cured by Islam? Unfortunately, it's not so simple and like any illness faith may help you cope with it but it isn't a cure. The outcome is that there are thousands of clinically depressed but frustrated people living amongst us. They are constantly depressed, they don't take treatment and they can't end their lives either. There must be an outlet then for these feelings right? From here, I think you can guess what my next conclusion is.
Whereas in the third world, poverty and illiteracy can be exploited to turn people into killers, it is a different story in the west. One of the Glasgow airport bombers was a doctor, the lead member of the 7/7 bombers was a family man with wife, child and a wonderful job working with children.
Why do educated people, with every opportunity in life, choose to give it all up for a faraway cause? What makes people put aside all the good things in their lives; their families, their friends and all the benefits that their parents struggled to come to the UK to provide them with?
You may argue that the prevalence of injustice in the world, the killing of Muslims and constant warfare leads some pious people unable to look away, so they dedicate their lives to fighting back. This may be true, there are many campaigners, ideologues, activists and leaders who have dedicated their lives to a cause and worked obsessively to achieve it.
But I am talking about the ones who are less constructive - the ones who go too far, the ones who sit at home researching bomb-making on the internet, the ones who stay up at 3am repeatedly watching videos of gruesome killings, the ones who are willing to kill and be killed at the earliest opportunity based on some internet sermons. These are the one who have a problem I think, they have a mental vulnerability perhaps?
On closer inspection, these people exhibit the exact symptoms of being clinically depressed:
Feeling hopeless and helpless, continuous low mood or sadness, feeling guilt-ridden, feeling irritable and intolerant of others, being unable to take interest in everyday things, not getting any enjoyment out of life.
Most importantly - they have suicidal tendencies and a desire to end it all.
These are the exact elements required to create a terrorist or a bomber. Perhaps, it should come as no surprise then that middle class or affluent, modern Muslims are some of the easiest to recruit into terror. Depression combined with a lack of direction, lack of a challenge and lack of purpose in life may be the major reasons young Muslims join extremist groups and start contributing to global terrorism.
Maybe we should all be a little more aware of those around us, our relatives and our close ones to ensure that their weaknesses are not abused by evil hands.
