Thursday, March 5, 2015

Are We Doing Something Wrong?

I was shocked to learn that about 200 young Canadians have run off to join the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (often called 'ISIS' or 'ISIL'), the radical terrorist group in Syria and Iraq.  It also bothered me that about the same number of young Americans ran off to join, even though the population of the United States is ten times that of Canada!  

Is Canada becoming a terrorist recruitment center?  If so, we're doing something wrong here.

Is it our "Cultural Mosaic" idea that is fostering this?   Canada prides itself on being a mosaic of cultures instead of the American "Melting Pot."  We encourage folks to enrich our Canadian culture with their own, brought from the four corners of the Earth.  We're also encouraging our native groups to resurrect and build back their cultures, so many of which have been almost lost.

I personally think this approach makes Canada stronger and more tolerant, in a world here practically everywhere and every culture is accessible in hours rather than months!

But we are, first and foremost, Canadians!  But do these young people heading over to Syria understand that?  Maybe they're heading over there looking for risk and adventure, much like the Canadians who ran off to fight against Franco in the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s. 

I don't know.  But I do think we have to examine what we are doing (or not doing) that encourages these young people to join a terrorist group overseas.