Boko Haram, fundamentalists from Christianity and Islam

One of the truths about humanity is that we are all the heroes of our own stories – we all see ourselves as the protagonists.

So we tend not to view ourselves as bad people, when we do bad things we like to think we’re breaking couple of eggs to make omelets.

Torture apologists tend to argue that war crimes are a “necessary evil” to stop greater evils, they see torture as taking the tough decisions.

The image I picked to illustrate this post about Boko Haram is of an advert from Answers in Genesis, a Christian creationist group, put up in America a few years ago.

Now you could say it seems odd to take a Christian banner as being a way to understand an Islamist group – but consider what the banner says.

“If God doesn’t matter to him, do you?”

What amounted to the same argument is the topic of a current fight in America, when a university chancellor sent around a video talking about how Christianity is so important to maintaining American “freedoms.”

The American fundamentalist is terrified that without their religion running the show – the country will devolve into amorality and chaos, and they're willing to go to some great lengths to stop that happening.

They think they are heroes, while everyone else thinks they’re oppressors.

And this is where Boko Haram comes in. They aren’t sub-human monsters fighting for oppression and slavery; they believe that their values are what make society fundamentally work.

And the slaughter of 150 people, selling little girls into sexual slavery, the various evils they commit to further their cause?

All of that comes from the same reasoning as that street advert, and the same fears. They look upon what they’re doing as breaking a couple of eggs for the greater good.

The thing is though, if they have this much in common with Christian fundamentalists why aren’t the Christians going around doing the same thing?

Well who says they aren’t? Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army is Christian, the KKK is a Christian terrorist organisation, and Anders Breivik killed children in the name of “cultural Christianity.”

Christianity however is weaker than Islam, because for the most part it is okay to be a Christian apostate, to criticise the teachings of Christianity and to mock its central figures.

The ability to argue against Christianity also means that the worse teachings end up falling by the wayside over time.

Sure, atheists tend to be ahead of Christians when it comes to socially progressive values – but the fact that atheists can argue for those values without fearing jail time or death (for the most part), and use the regressive values contained within the Bible to argue against it, is an important ingredient in moderating the harms that can come of Christian beliefs.

When the current Charlie Hebdo cover, a cover expressing forgiveness, is something news organisations are hesitant to put on their pages on stories about that cover, that sense of taboo empowers groups like Boko Haram.

Boko Haram are inspired by their religion – because they bought the lie that morality and concern for other people comes from God. They have their following, because there isn’t the permissive atmosphere required to make their ideas look silly.

If you can’t mock the prophet, good luck with the Quran and Shariah law.