Political scientist Samuel Huntington predicted that one of the outcomes of Globalization would be a change in the way we perceive the global society. He said that what would become “the Global Village” would erase any meaning of countries, and divide the global society into civilizations. Because of that, he said, future conflicts would be between civilizations, but mostly, between “The West” and “The Rest.” This day has (sort of) come, it is now our present, and a war is currently ongoing, between the western world and the global Jihad, aiming to fight this “westernization” in all means necessary.
If the global society would have indeed erased all national symbols and identities, and regroup as civilizations only, this war would have been much easier to be determined. “The West” would have fought, united, against Islamic terror, and Jihad would have been pushed back to the dark hole it crawled out of. Sadly for us, things are more complicated than Huntington’s theory. On the one hand, the world has become a “Global Village,” as people are becoming closer, sharing beliefs and culture, making connections, and forming a “Western civilization.” On the other hand, national and religious symbols and identities still exist, preventing us from completely becoming one almost-global community.
Nationality and religion are the two things people are willing to kill for, even today. Those things are our sources of pride and essence, and they are being the buffer, preventing us from really uniting against terror. Because our “Western civilization” is still divided into states, we naturally become indifferent, or even resentful towards “other people.” That’s why we won’t hurry to stand up for a fellow “Western” in need, if he is not part of our local community. Instead of defining this “Western civilization” as “us,” and Islamic terror as “them,” we look at all the other fractions of the “Western civilization” as “them” as well.
In the meantime, terror makes its way to all our countries, penetrating this “Western civilization” from all directions, and using our inner-conflicts to get in deeper. Because we look differently at a terror attack taking place in a different country (or even in our country, but aimed at a minority,) and one taking place in our backyard, we now stand on the losing side of this war. It’s a war of darkness against light, of diversity against homogeneousness, of words against violence. And in this war – we are all on the same side.
The Islamic Jihad, on all its extensions, vowed to fight against “the West” and its values, and spread religious Islam throughout the world. On its way of achieving this goal, the global Jihad will stop at nothing. As the sane majority of the world, we must unite against terror, and not only when it’s convenient or involves us directly. We are all targets of the global Jihad, even if it doesn’t seem like it now.
In the age of social media, standing up to or for something or someone is a few mouse-clicks away. It takes little effort, but can make a big change. In order to win this war, we must realize we are all on the same side, and put our differences aside. We must acknowledge our shared traits and our shared willingness to fight terror, and look at all terror attacks as attempts to hurt us all, as a civilization. In the age of globalization, the war on terror is not between religions or minority groups, but a clash of two civilizations.
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