"Do not be deceived by my peaceful face. I have a heart of stone."
Interview with an interesting woman.
It’s nothing new, but I observe that the reason certain segments of the western media are fascinated by the idea of a female suicide bomber is because there is this feeling that blowing oneself up in furtherance of a cause is an ultra-rational activity, overcoming the ‘natural’ or feminine human inclination to self-preservation, and thus according to the law of oppositions and what have you is a hyper-masculine act. Conversely this is twinned with the feeling that young men, the celebrated pinnacle of rude and unbridled animalistic masculinity, are dangerous because of their ‘irrational’ hot-headedness; that suicide bombing is overwhelmingly a young man’s response to the hopelessness of injustice. Suicide bombers, in our western imaginary, are young and fiery (men) and really scared but determined to revenge/avenge/kill/maim etc, overcoming their fear in furtherance of their cause.
Naturally a young female suicide bomber is a problem to be investigated and probed, because young women are suppose to be, you know, the curb on young men’s violence and misdirected sexual energy and a symbol of the home and hearth or something, and not supposed to be encouraging or participating in this hyper-rational irrationality. Hence this article and others like it.
Journalists are lazy. In times of national crisis when the cultural values or vital life of the patria itself are threatened, one heavily-subscribed-to western narrative is the rise of a particular matriarchal archetype, the female warrior who spurs on male warriors to resistance and victory against the invaders; think Boadiccea, or Malalai Joya, or Pauline Hanson. When western journalists investigate the female suicide bomber, there is a tendancy to frame these women through this narrative because otherwise it’s too puzzling. I can’t be bothered to examine whether this cultural lens is positive or negative or even what those terms might mean in the context of writing about people blowing themselves up in a war. I will say, that this stuff gives me the heebie jeebies, because if my nation were the invaded rather than the aggressor in this situation, I could certainly see myself going down this path.
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