What Fight Club teaches us about ISIS

Twisted? Of course. But at least for western recruits, they liberate themselves from a culture of banality. Meaning-seeking members of a society that no longer believes in "meta-narratives" (Lyotard) will be drawn to groups that continue to believe in them, no matter how demented their meta-narratives might be.

And, indeed, by joining their own versions of "Fight Club," these recruits do not only prove to themselves and others that they're "alive" but they also prove they're willing to give up their lives for their grand narrative of choice. Another great and passionate philosopher, Slavoj Zizek, reveals why it is this readiness to sacrifice one's life that might be what we westerners find most shocking about events like 9/11: "we, in First World countries, find it more and more difficult even to imagine a public or universal Cause for which we would be ready to sacrifice our life . . ." (Welcome to the Desert of the Real!,p. 40).

A question: which one of us would give up our lives for a cause?

The pause or silence which meets this question reveals the extent to which our western society has become comfortable, mediocre, apathetic.

And as long as our society stays that way, I wouldn't be surprised to find that groups like ISIS continue to lure more western recruits yearning for a big-picture purpose.