The bloodiest Friday night in Paris: Religion and globalisation of security

“The people behind last night’s attacks weren’t Muslims, they were extremists using religion as vindication for their cowardice.”
– Leigh Matthews

Barely 24 hours after Paris attack that killed at least 127people on Friday night, November 13, 2013, the European Union’s open border policy that has allowed free movement for refugees seeking asylum come under fire. The horrific event is the country’s worst terrorist atrocity till date as the President of French country, François Hollande, has describe the attack as an ‘act of war’.

In the wake of Paris attack, France is set to regain control of its borders permanently. Poland is also set to retain full control over its borders, asylum and immigration. for her foremost and proponent policy of openness towards refugees, German chancellor, Angela Merkel, is also increasingly coming under fire of the more conservative factions of her country, other countries and world leaders and delegates who have hitherto disapproved or opposed the allowance of free movement for refugees seeking asylum in other countries. For example, Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orban and virtually all the republican governors and party member of U.S. are some of the people who have been loud in their position against refugees’ intake.

Donald Trump has come out to say the attack in Paris has proven why the U.S. shouldn’t allow refugees through her borders. The Republican presidential front-runner said that Syrian refugees could be an ISIS ‘plot’ or ‘Trojan horse’ to launch a massive ‘military coup’ against Unite States. Also, over half of U.S. states governors have shut their doors to Syrian refugees reiterating that they will oppose any attempt to relocate Syrian refugees to their states through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Programme under President Obama’s Administration.

However, an open letter by Leigh Matthews, from Cardiff, where he aired his feelings about anti-Moslem sentiments following the attack that took place in Paris that night have been about to shine a brighter light on the incidence . In a Facebook post that has since been shared over 42,500 times, he said: “The people behind last night’s attacks weren’t Moslems; they were extremists using religion as vindication for their cowardice.” The most fascinating about his post was that it was astutely designed and intended to subtly educate people on who is to blamed concerning the people (Moslems) generally behind (or believed to behind) horrific attacks across the globe. He carefully urge us each and every one of us not to ‘lay blame at the doors of the innocent just because of what they believe (religion) as they are no more to blame for ‘ Paris-like’ attack than we all are.

It is more or less unjustified that Moslems are being blamed on the one hand while the refugees are being blamed on the other. However, the real ‘who’ to blame obviously remains at-large or elusive to people and the world leaders, especially when considering their interests or gains in their game of national and global politics.

Though the Paris attacks have drawn renewed attention to Europe’s growing Moslem population which has been increasing steadily by about one percentage point a decade – from six per cent in 1990 to six per cent in 2010 populations according to US-based Pew Research Centre. Leigh Matthews has, however, carefully been able to throw more light on who is (or not) to be blamed from the Moslem perspective, especially considering the fact that in the EU, Germany and France have the biggest Moslem populations

As Leigh Matthews’s exposited, it is debilitating that Moslems are increasingly being blamed wrongly as the people behind the Paris attack. Much more, it is not uplifting to hear that the reason for the Paris attack is seen to be the policy of openness towards refugees fleeing from horrific violence and persecution from their home country, Syria.

Historically, security is seen as an all-inclusive or encompassing term that denotes safety and protection from variety of threats or attacks. Security is the protection of humans and their tangible and intangible asset from a variety of threats posed by other human beings and other non-living and living things like technology, economy or commerce system, animals, environmental hazards such as global warming and so on. Security is also the protection of the tangible and intangible assets of other non-living and living things like (economy system, policies, environment and technology) from threats posed by humans.

However, security at the nuclei level is essentially the protection of human beings (not necessarily their tangible and intangible assets) from threats posed by other malevolent people. In other words, security is the protection of man from (other) man- that is, it is an ‘inter-human affair’ or a ‘human-to-human’ affair. In the real sense of it, security is ‘not’ the protection of humans from other variety of threats posed by the likes of technology, economy or commerce system, animals, environmental hazards, for instance, global warming and so on except, they are being used as instrument of harm by human beings.

Security is not also the protection of the tangible and intangible assets of other living and non-living things like technology, economy or commerce system, animals, environment from threats posed by man. Security, at the unit or embryonic level, is essentially a ‘’human-to-human’ affair: not human-to- other living and non-living thing affair, neither is it ‘other living and non-living thing-to-human affair’.

It goes to say that we would be hitting the nail on the head in a security discourse that is about protection of humans (not necessarily their intangible and tangible assets) from other hostile or malevolent human beings. We won’t be approaching the heart of security matters by discussing the protection of tangible and intangible asset of man from threat posed by other forms of living or non-living thing (for example, technology, economy system, policies, animals, nature accident and environmental hazards). We won’t either be getting far with a security discussion that is focused on the protection of tangible and intangible assets of other forms of living or non-living thing from threats posed by man.

If you want to determine for fact, how secured a nation is, the best way of ascertaining that is primarily from examining threats posed by mans against his fellow man. The United States is increasingly under threat of global warming against its people, but it is believed to be one of the most secured countries of the world. That is, if we have to talk in the real context – heart of security, there is direct involvement, often in form of violence, between humans against other humans, though the involvement could be from a distance. As such that is why ‘physical security’ which is a system that seeks to minimise threats posed by humans is said to be the heart of security.

In today’s language, security may be seen as essentially the protection of man from the ‘extremist’. Security is not the protection of humans from Moslem. Neither is it the protection of humans from refugees. That is, in the Paris case, it is wrong for security to be defined as the protection of Paris people from refugees or the protection of the Paris people from Moslems. If we choose to define security in these terms, we would be adding more coal to fire of insurgency that is sweeping the globe.

It is strategy and nature of criminals (harmful individuals) to exploit or use a system as vindication for their cowardice. Just as some group of criminals like armed robbers and financial fraudsters may use economic system as vindication for their cowardice, smugglers may use immigration systems as vindication for their cowardice, rioters may make use of political system as vindication for their cowardice, militants like the Niger- Delta may use judiciary system (injustice) as their own vindication for their cowardice and so on.

However, religion is increasingly been used by extremists as vindication for their cowardice. In contemporary times, religion has been the system most used by terrorists as vindication. The reason for this is not farfetched; it is believed that man created religion having realised that the only time (system) possible for him to live or feel above his fears is the present, as the past gives regrets and future uncertainties. As such, religion is created by man to forgive him of what he had done wrong in the past and tells him not to worry for the future. That is, man hides his cowardice to face the worries or uncertainties of his tomorrow by embracing religion while believing he is continually forgiven of his past wrongs or regret.

Man has found religion as a place—a system—possible for him to live or feel forgiven of his past wrongs- that is, no regrets, a place (system) where he can have no worry about the uncertainties of his future-that is, no fears, and a place (system) where he can always and at the moment live or feel above his fears- that is, happy. It is based on a wrong interpretation of this understanding that extremist –jihadist – use religion as vindication for his cowardice.

It is unfortunate that religion is increasingly been established as creation made by man. And so, religion has lost its bearing in harmonising the belief or mind of individuals unto a common love. On the one side of the coin, religion is the strongest system that can be used to produce hate, on the other side of the coin; it is the strongest system that can be used to produce love. That is, religion helps to produce a psychological energy that is either used to generate or fuel hate or love—as such, the extremist has been able to use it to produce hate.

TO BE CONTINUED

Adeyemi is of TL First which is a part of Integrated Management Group and an international firm of accountants, productivity & improvement advisers, leadership & management transformation consultants.
adebiyiadeyemi@outlook.com