Journey: Innocent to Smart Bomb

Introduction:Basically, this document addresses the following question:How a human is transformed into live ammunition?Life of a suicide bomber, Zainullah, has been analyzed from the perspective of different sociological theories including Conflict Theory, Crimes and Deviance, Reinforcement and Social Learning Theory.Description:Zainullah was a 14 year old boy from Mehmind Agency. He belonged to a poor family. His family was not able to afford the expenditures of his education so , he used to work with his father . One day, a group of people whom he had never seen before visited his father and before leaving they handed him a handsome amount of money. After some days, his father told him that he had made some arrangements for his education and was soon going to send him to a religious school. Zain- ullah was enthusiastic about Islam so he accepted it. A week later, some people came and took him to a far away, segregated school and started educating him.Syllabus at the school comprised of the Holy Book and narrations of Holy Prophet (pbuh). He had non-translated Arabic versions of Holy Book therefore, he fully relied on the teachers. Mostly, their teachers focused on the verses pertinent to the Jihad. He was taught to refrain himself from the worldly desires, prepare for the world hereafter and long for the bounties of heaven. There were more than two hundred students in the dormitory and none of them had any access to the TV, radio or newspaper. He also had classes for basic physical training. After 6 months of basic training, he was given the training of arms and ammunition.Teachers told him that it was of enormous reward to kill an infidel and used to present multiple arguments to label others as infidels.. Fidaes (suicide bomber) were highly appreciated in the school and teachers told them that those were the successful people in the both worlds. Seeing multiple young students going for a bomb blasts had become an inspiration for him.After one year of education and training, Zain Ullah was taken for a meeting with a higher official of the school in Peshawar. As he was passing through the streets of city, he listened a cleric who was telling that killing of innocent people is forbidden in Islam. This statement made him question his teacher about his lessons. His teacher replied that no one would ask him to kill innocent people, he had to kill infidels and in return he would be rewarded in eternity.One day, Zain Ullah was offered to be the part of a team which was going to do a blast on a shrine. He felt as if a dream came true. He promptly accepted the offer and soon recruited himself in the team. All preparations were made and ,with the final instructions, both the teammates were dropped at the destination.They walked in the shrine. For a while, they observed devotees performing different rituals and expressing their devotion. After it, they did a suicide blast resulting in multiple casualties and injured people.Sociological Analysis:Following is the sociological analysis of the above mentioned event in the light of different theories:1. Conflict Theory of Deviance and Crime:

Class struggle happens when the rich business owners (called bourgeoisie) pay everyday workers (called proletariat), to make things for them to sell. The workers have no say in their pay or what things they make, since they can not live without a job or money. Also;People deviate because of the social inequality.

Zainullahs father handed him to Taliban because they promised him monthly stipend for his family. So, from the perspective of a conflict theorist, the root cause of this crime was poverty which is a consequence of exploitation of rights of proletariats by the bourgeoisie.Appendix A

2. Structural Strain Theory:

Innovative Deviance:

According to Robert Merton, a deviance in which the set goals are accepted by the society but the means to achieve them are rejected is called innovative deviance.

Zainullahs father innovatively deviated from the norms of society. He was sick of poverty. His goal to meet the expenditures of his family was acceptable by the society but, the way he adopted to achieve his goal was no way acceptable.

Conformity:Behaving in accordance with real or imagined social norms, rules and expectation is called Conformity.In the current study, Zainullah conforms with the norms of its group which leads him to become a suicide bomber.

3. Altruistic Suicide:A suicide that occurs because of the extreme cohesion in a group is called Altruistic Suicide. The person committing suicide only cares about the norms of the group and can do anything to conform with them.Zainullah committed suicide because it was in conformity with the norms of his secondary socialization group. He had been living with them for years, as a result, there was strong cohesion in the group. The cohesion made him not to deviate from the norms of group.

4. Social Learning Theory:According to B.F Skinner:

Positive reinforcement plus the presence of an admired role model makes the particular behavior highly likely.

John Braithwaite said that Nations with low crime rates are those where shaming has great social power.Positive reinforcements for him were the high appreciation of the suicide bombers and the lures of bounties of heaven. Extremists were represented as the role models. He had never been a subject to reintegrative shaming in his group. All these factors were helpful in transforming him into live ammunition.

5. Differential Association Theory:

Differential association theory, a type of symbolic interaction theory interprets deviance, including criminal behavior, as behavior one learns through interaction with others..

Zainullah became an extremist because of his continuous interaction with extremists. He learnt this behavior through his interaction with the other students in the camp.

6. Sapir- Whorf Hypothesis:The SapirWhorf hypothesis, asserts that language determines other aspects of culture because language provides the categories through which social reality is defined.

All the students, including Zainullah were instructed to read Quran which was in Arabic. No translation was provided to them so that they could not understand it. Consequently, it was easier to exploit their minds and mold them according to will of teachers.

7. Labelling Theory:It says that deviance is found, not in the act, but in the response, in the label applied. Once applied, the deviant label is difficult to shed.

Zainullahs trainers tagged others as infidels. They told him that killing an infidel would redeem and make him eligible for the non-ending bounties of heaven. Once, a specific target was labeled as infidel and Zainullah was positively reinforced for its killing, it was easier for him to commit a crime with zero range of tolerance.

8. John Hagans Types of Crime:According to John Hagan:

An act deemed very harmful and wrong, and for which the harshest criminal sanctions is reserved is called Consensus Crime.

Suicide attack resulted multiple casualties. Killing any innocent person is one of the worst crimes for which strict formal sanctions and legislation exists. So, Zainullahs suicide was a consensus crime as well.

9. Impression Management and Dramaturgy:

According to Erving Goffman, impression management is a process through which people control how other perceive them. Impression management can be seen as a type ofcon game. We willfully attempt to manipulate others impressions of us

Zainullahs teachers never told them that they were killing innocent people. They had strictly prohibited students from watching TV, listening to radio, reading newspaper or any other book not prescribed by the tutor because ,through these means, he could probably know that he was put on the wrong track. So, teachers (con actors) manipulated him.