Moroccan Isis Terrorists Linking the Past to the Present


In our reading this week we were introduced to the idea of Africa and how the whole history of Africa may be an illusion in itself created from outsiders looking in. It is the bias ingrained in these accounts of "history" which makes it crucial for students in the modern day to analyze this history with a grain of salt. In A Very Short Introduction it is stated, "It was the Atlantic slave trade...that forged an explicit link in European minds between racial inferiority, enslavement, and Africa" ( pg 6). The modern day Europe and all of the Americas would not be what they are today without the Atlantic Slave Trade. So this begs the question if slaves from Africa were so essential to the success of the Western world why is it that social and racial inferiority are linked to the idea Africa. The Guardian stated in an article how Moroccan Isis terrorists are now posing a large threat at the border of Europe, and how the majority of these Isis supporters came from European countries where they felt oppressed and did not have a full opportunity to succeed like France or Spain. The article states that these Isis supporters felt, "a sense of class struggle in societies that they perceived as unwelcoming..." which could be a direct result of this idea that is ingrained in the Eurocentric view that racial inferiority and Africa go hand in hand. The problem of modern day terrorism could be correlated to the social oppression felt worldwide and in turn is now manifesting itself into extremist behavior.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/20/spain-terror-attacks-isis-morocco

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