Virginia Postrel on Glamor and Terror

Like much of modern life, even terrorism can be glamorized

By Virginia Postrel Monday, Aug. 05, 2013

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    Unlike traditional soldiering, Islamist terrorism provides a sense of belonging even to those operating independently of a larger group or cell. "We Muslims are one body, you hurt one, you hurt us all," Tsarnaev wrote as he hid from authorities. Taking up the greater cause allows an alienated youth to feel part of something special, even as his personal problems dissolve in the larger whole. Radical jihadism taps into the glory of "changing the world" as surely as any other political movement.

    It's easiest to imagine an ideal life in a time or place you know only from selective images, whether that's Ernest Hemingway's Paris, Ayn Rand's Galt's Gulch or Carrie Bradshaw's New York City. For political movements, the distant ideal may be a future utopia, a past golden age or a faraway homeland. With its dreams of a restored caliphate, Islamist terrorism combines utopia and a golden age. For second-generation immigrants in secularized and non-Muslim societies, it may also draw on the glamour of a distant homeland. A friend told Reitman that Tsarnaev "would always talk about how pretty Chechen girls were" even though he hardly knew any. "I want out," Tsarnaev tweeted in March 2012.

    Critics who fear that putting terrorists on magazine covers may encourage future violence have a point. Fame is a spur. But Islamist terrorism draws on much more complex and powerful forms of glamour than a desire for rock-star treatment. Dispelling that magic is both harder and more essential than denouncing Rolling Stone.

    Postrel is the author of The Power of Glamour, to be published by Simon & Schuster in November

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