Just Say No

The United States has always been convinced that telling people “not to be bad” is an effective messaging tool. With long-standing and deep puritanical values – many gleaned from Spartan Protestantism and Teutonic values that continue in many parts of Europe – America has long been a society that castigates “evil” rather than encouraging the attractive values of “good.” Hellfire vs. heaven.

Whether it’s Cotton Mather and the Salem Witch trials from the 17^th century, the failed experiment with Prohibition in the 1920s or Nancy’s Regan’s misplaced goody-two-shoes “just say no to drugs” campaign of the early 1980s, the politics and morality of “no” have been the dominant “marketing technique” against negative values throughout our history. Even our anti-smoking campaigns didn’t take traction until the positive attributes of healthy living took over the underlying message. Excluding states where marijuana usage is legal, we have never had so many users of illicit narcotics, and never experienced prisons with more convicts charged with drug crimes, than we do today.

When you factor in teenage rebellion and the general iconoclasm of the young, saying “no” often defines the rebellion more clearly, making it absolutely clear how to piss off parents and society most effectively. Add a dash of teenage misfits’ being angry at the world, and you can see how negativity provides new answers and horrific goals. For whatever reason, the underlying moral outrage experienced by those who fear or hate certain categories of behavior seems to imbue them with the right to cast stones, decry behavior and slam participants in their perceived values violations with intense and personal opprobrium… and where they can get it… criminal prosecution.

There are lots of problems with this approach. First, many are looking for precisely how to be bad. Second, the minor transgressions of youth often represent a “crossing of a line” the redefines the participant. The behavior falls within “evil,” so they have made the transition forever. You can even see this phenomenon in our proclivity for extreme personal attacks on perceived violations of this ethos (“I didn’t inhale”) in political campaigns… reaching deep into candidates’ distant past to find reasons why they are currently unfit for office. We execute murderers, claiming deterrent value, but murder rates seem hardly impacted. We are obsessed with finding fault.

Here’s the bottom line: relying on negative invectives to change behavior is only effective with a very few individuals. It just doesn’t work on most of us. “You’re bad if you do” is among the least effective methods of persuasion we can embrace, particularly against teenagers and young adults. We even apply this approach in our foreign policy, where hurling invectives and moral castigation in general often produce results only when coupled when accompanied by hard political or military costs (which activity do you think is more effective?). Still we feel that we can insult and intimidate masses of people into complying with our wishes. Like being called the “Great Satan” by Muslim extremists has changed an iota of our self-perception or behavior.

Which brings me to how Muslim extremists “recruit.” With the Islamic State outdrawing any other extremist in Muslim volunteers from the West, they are primarily attracting people to their message, not castigating those who fail to see moral badness of their current choices. Their “badness” is their positive calling card, having drawn categories of young fighters or participants (baby factories for young girls flying in to marry courageous fighters… making for more future fighters) who find that lifestyle to be an answer for their current mental disarray.

“Islamic State propaganda pulls no punches. Beheading videos, boasts about enslaving women, promises of austere Sharia-led lives, it’s all there. You want what it offers? Come along, because Islamic State wants people who make a positive commitment to join.

“The group’s presentation is professional and serious, particularly through its Al Hayat Media Center (no connection to the unaffiliated Egyptian TV channel with a similar name), and aimed specifically at non-Arabic speakers via videos and a magazine based on al Qaeda’s infamous Inspire.

“The strategy seems to be working, though numbers vary. From 12 to 300 Americans have left the country to join Islamic State. Recruitment in Europe and the Arab world is reportedly strong. Some even claim Islamic State are [sic] drawing foreign recruits away from the Taliban.

“The State Department’s propaganda uses a negative message to counter the attraction of Islamic State media. Started in 2011, it was only in foreign languages, moving into social media — and English – in 2013. This year the work started showing up on YouTube. The current theme of State’s efforts is ‘Think Again, Turn Away’ and the messaging can be found on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and even on the sides of buses in New York City. One YouTube video includes subtitles such as ‘learn useful skills, such as blowing up mosques’ and ‘crucifying Muslims.’ Another features oil being poured on the ground framed as ‘squandering public resources.’” Peter Van Buren writing for Reuters, October 21^st.

We obsessed with “I’m right and you’re wrong, so you have to do it my way” politics. Easy to counter if you are a smart extremist. What is the American way? Just show those hideous 2006 photographs from Abu Ghraib Prison showing American military humiliating naked hooded Muslim captives from the Iraq War… and then show the power and success of the new retaliation – ISIL and its obvious barely checked military triumphs and conquests. The Islamic State is powerful, and you can partake of the power, challenging the rest of the world like no other, screams their message. The world fears us, but we have no fear… God is on our side… join our cause. A powerful, terrifying if false message. You too can behead evil.

But exactly what do we offer? Under-employment or unemployment (a bleak future for too many young), racial tension, white conservatives railing against people of color wanting to erect massive border barriers only on our border with darker-skinned people in the south, leaving open the great white border top the north. Where’s our powerful message? Where’s our truly attractive power based on a higher moral ground?

And as these dark-skinned ultra-violent Arab warriors and their admirers continue to take more territory despite our aerial bombardment, which side looks stronger? Iraqi Muslims have destabilized what we spent a decade trying to build and protect. Afghani Taliban are already mounting growing successful attacks as NATO forces never even stabilized that land. Little guys beating the crap out of the biggest power on earth, and as much as our government and press spread the word of righteous victory, history is spinning a very different result.

It’s time to spread the positive message of America, who we really are and what we really value. Attract the world. Send the message of a good America that’s good for the individuals who partake of its real values. And it’s time to start acting like a government that really cares about its people, prioritizing average Americans, a value that seems to have slipped into a distant second or third place among too many politicians desperately catering to an elite to fund their campaigns!

 I’m Peter Dekom, and it’s time to start acting like the great country we truly can be, not by cowering in dysfunctional negativity