abaya

I am not sure why I am bothering to reply, since the discussion in this thread is going nowhere... oh well.

Let's review my posts. I did not say that "people become terrorists because of poverty." I said, "It is precisely because of the material conditions of both groups that any ideology of violence or looting becomes justifiable." The last two words are key. I am not implying that poverty determine violence 100%. In fact, I actually said this in a later post, but maybe you didn't see it: "Poverty does not determine behavior 100%, I certainly agree. But being black or brown or living in a ghetto does not a violent person make. Material conditions have a very strong impact on culture and social organization in particular" I am not an environmental determinist. Cultural materialism is not the same as determinism. There is not a 100% causal relationship here, but the correlation is pretty goddamn strong, I can tell you that. roachboy did an excellent job earlier of showing the incredibly complex reasons for why people MIGHT behave the way they do, including poverty, class, politics, etc. What it boils down to is that ideology, religious or otherwise, is at the BOTTOM of the list for causal explanations.

And you are right about the Marxism part; anyone who knows anything about materialist theory would recognize that. However, armchair I am not. I am a cultural anthropologist, and it's my actual, paid job to get out of my armchair/computer desk/whatever and go to other countries and cultures and conduct on-the-ground ethnography, trying to figure out both the etic and emic views to increase understanding. You can accuse me of drawing my theoretical underpinnings from Marx and I'll proudly stand up for that (most social scientists do), but please do not call me an armchair anything. Unless you've ever gone to the Middle East and asked people why they do what they do? Or even just asked some Middle Eastern friends here in the US? (Do you have any Middle Eastern friends?)

EDIT: roachboy beat me to it...

__________________
And think not you can direct the course of Love;
for Love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
--Khalil Gibran