Suicide Bombing and Disillusioned Youth

I have just finished THE TIPPING POINT by Malcom Gladwell.

It mentions a spate of copy-cat male adolescent suicides in Micronesa after an adolescent took his own life, rather similar to the spate of group suicides recently in Northern Ireland.

Suicide bombers are mainly young men. Suicide bombing actually began in Sri Lanka before it became widely adopted. It was not an Islamic invention, as so many believe.

I suppose it is "one up" from throwing yourself in front of a tube train during the rush hour to express your dissatisfaction at the way life is treating you.

What could be more satisfying than to express yourself in this way (should you be suicidally-inclined young man, particularly if you were brought up as a Muslim)?

It is exciting and emotionally satisfying to give up your life for a supposedly noble cause when you have no wish to live it anyway.

Blame this on their religion if you like, but I think this sort of angst takes the form of either suicide bombing or running amuck (a Malay word for axe-murderer) with a gun, like that Korean who used his fellow students as target practice on a Virginia campus in the US. It affects all races, religions and cultures but the form it takes depends on the weapons available to the suicide. Imitation is also a significant factor.

Unpleasant emotions of adolescent alienation are as old as the hills even if the destruction wrought in their name takes new and frightening forms.

There really is nothing new under the sun.