Do Canadian Muslim Youth Rebel

Abstract

With the rise of terrorist attacks in European countries, the topic of secondgenerationMuslims living in the West becomes heated more than ever. SecondgenerationMuslims are born and raised in Canada and usually have multipleethnic backgrounds. They need to deal with multiple identities as well as beingyoung, which comes with its own challenges. For the purpose of this paper,seven in-depth interviews were conducted on young Muslim men and women.This paper seeks to illuminate issues of Muslim youth rebellion by asking whomthey rebel against. The paper examines how and why in rare instances a formof rebellion by Muslim youth has led to terrorism. This study shows that not allthe religious and cultural identity crises of Muslim youth leads to violence andterrorism. The majority of Muslim youth rebellion is directed against their parents’cultures, rather than against Western liberal values or Islam.