roachboy

that's because you haven't done any reasearch, ustwo, and so havent the faintest idea what you are talking about. unless you think that all arabs are basically the same, that all muslims are arabs, and that knowing factoids about **some** aspects of the situation in saudi arabia means that you know everything you need to in order to write authoritative sounding sentences. (it's hard to write while listening to morton subotnik's music, btw--in case you were wondering what it would be like)

researchers working in france and north africa have shown that the vast majority of "fundamentalist" variants of islam--the small, socially marginal groups that you refer to when you think you are talking about islam in general---the folk who identify share certain features:
they tend to be poor to very poor
they come from socially and culturally marginal areas
they are the main are quite young (under 30).

now you *could* make the argument that, in this case, judging from much of the work on these areas, that poverty in itself is not enough to explain these groups--you have to factor in the other two.
well those....and you need to add:
the complex politics of the major organizations that run the various muslim communities within each nation-state;
the characteristics of state power;
the history of relations between these states and the major administrative entities that comprise the muslim community

for example

....and matters of geography--physical, economic, social, cultural, religious....

to the factors of poverty and sense of marginalization (which may or may not be directly linked to poverty) and the sense of foreclosure of possibilities experienced by younger generations within the more marginalized areas.

then you might be able to model these groups

but if you wanted to extend the modelling, you'd have to gather parallel types of information for each new area you tried to include. that is because local histories matter, ustwo--and muslims have them--and they are every bit as complex and meaningful to the folk who live within them, who make them, as yours is to you.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite