As for ISIS, I think it is everyone’s problem and the sooner we realize this the better. I’m not sure of the strategy embraced by some to keep insisting “it’s not terrorism”. Sure there are airheads among us who find the term threatening and would be liable to overreact. The problem is, the more you deny what is in front ot you, the more you manufacture air heads who get alarmed at the slightest thing. As Nietzsche knew, the more you feed your need for moral refinement and sensitivity, the more that grows. Soon you will be purging anyone who doesn’t have the same quotient of air in their head as you. And to make that plain, this endless refinement of our sensitivities would make things worse rather than better as we all look inwards and purge ourselves of minor and meaningless flaws, whilst the real barbarians get to do whatever they like.
This is another way of saying that psychology does not follow the same trajectory as one’s political ideals. If I want to go further to the left, I need to refrain from petty moralizing and splitting hairs about feelings. If I don’t want the left to be overrun by violent people, I need to grow up and realize there are violent people in the world.
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