Following Nietzsche’s suggestive insights, Fanon (1963), moved the argu-
ment from Master-Slave to colonizer and colonized. He argued that the affluent
and powerful colonizer not only dominated the colonized, but denigrated
the indigenous culture and deemed inferior the identities of the colonized in
order to legitimate their colonization. The “white man’s burden” was to bring
(Western/Christian) civilization to the uncivilized. Colonization of land, cul-
ture and mind, of course, leads to the rage and ressentementof the colonized,
but his/her rage was often turned inward, upon his/her very self and expressed
in self destructive behavior. The violence done to the culture of the colonized,
to the “wretched of the earth” fostered self-hatred and destructive behavior
such as crime, addiction or interpersonal violence. When Fanon (1963) wrote,
his context was colonialization, especially the French control of Algeria and
his homeland Martinique. Today, naked colonial power no longer endures as
such, yet much of his analysis remains cogent (Scatamburlo and Langman,
2001). Rather, globalization as a form of neo-colonialization that controls
investments, raw material prices, trade, investment etc. Moreover, the iden-
tities and cultures of the global elite are seen as superior to those of the under-
developed. Violence to the oppressor is not only cathartic, but becomes viewed
as the means to overcome political, economic or cultural domination.
This analysis suggests that the Islamic world has faced three major insults
and humiliations that have in turn bred ressentement toward the West. 1) When
Islam was one of the three most advanced cultures in the world, Christendom
was in its Dark Ages, superstition ruled and its peoples ran around in forests
in animal skins. But with the growth of trade, Europe was ascendant. The
defeat of the Muslims in Spain was emblematic of the declining power of the
Islamic world in the face of Christendom. Following its defeats at the out-
skirts of Vienna, Islam would continue to decline vis a vis Europe, especially
after merchant fleets circumvented caravan-based trade, the lifeblood of the
Muslim trading classes. 2) In the nineteenth century, European colonizers
took over many Muslim states. The last major Islamic power, the Ottoman
Caliphate, eventually succumbed, following a number of defeats by European
armies. Following the various independence movements after WWII, even
when nominally “independent”, the leadership of many Muslim countries
was still controlled by foreigners, especially the US that had secured power
and influence throughout the Muslim world, as for example in Saudi Arabia,
Egypt, and Persia. Often this power was secured through unscrupulous means
from bribery to coups. 3) The creation of the State of Israel was seen as a
daily reminder of Arabic political weakness that enabled the UN to establish
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