>Filming ritualistic beheadings is a propaganda technique.

Its a lot more than a propaganda technique. this is one of my huge problems with your entire argument, you conflate things as if they are even similar.

You are making the statement that ritualistic beheadings is no worse than anti-communist posters in the cold war era.

are they both techniques used by propagandists? absolutely. Are they in any way shape or form of the same magnitude of moral reprehensibility? absolutely not.

You are boiling something down to its most raw elements, then ignoring half of them. You cannot simply put aside the fact that beheadings involve beheading a person, and then hand wave that its the same as other forms of propaganda.

>but ISIS continues to produce the videos because it views the tradeoff as being beneficial to its growth and survival.

or because they are using terroristic threats to achieve political or economic goals.

>Due to financial constraints, combatants must be recruited with promises of glory in the afterlife

ahh but this does not in any way describe a grassroots political movement. you are describing not a political group but a military one.

>This is not possible without significant wealth, which is why a professional class of soldiers did not exist in Europe until economic development made it feasible.

yet armies existed without needing to rely on the promise of women to rape and glory in the afterlife. again you are not describing a grassroots political movement, but an organization that desires war in and of itself.

>Suicide bombings are not any different from drone strikes.

again you are conflating two absolutely different things as one by ignoring major parts of them.

what is a suicide bomb attack?
why would a group choose this type of attack over other types?
who is the intended target of this attack?
what message does this type of attack send to those on the receiving end?
what is the intent of the attack? to harm the enemy? to provoke fear amongst a civilian population? to take away the enemy's ability to take a specific action?
who are the innocents that could be harmed during this attack?

these same questions must be asked about a drone strike
what is the attacks intention?
who is the intended target of this attack?
what message does this type of attack send to those on the receiving end?
etc.

Have you ever met someone who operated a military drone? Do you believe they feel the same way as someone committing a suicide bombing would feel? Do you think these operators feel righteous authority when they launch missiles? Do you think they cheer at all the innocent civilians who were killed?

>This is the same goal of suicide bombings, incidentally.

oh now purposefully murdering groups of civilians is the same thing as flying drones over an area in military conflict.

>Rhetoric about entire populations of people and all the religious rhetoric is part of ISIS' growth strategy.

so its a grassroots movement that gets new members by promising them women to rape, glory in the afterlife and also lies about its motives completely? to the very members its trying to attract?

are you seeing why no one is buying this 'grassroots movement' line you keep bringing up? you are absolutely not describing a political movement. You are describing a militia through and through.

>Religion was used in the American abolitionist movement and anti-slavery movement, as well as the civil rights movement.

do you have any source videos of leaders of those movements calling for the deaths of vast groups of people? any live beheadings? any promise of women to rape? surely as you explained earlier, these upstart movements couldnt have gained any members without such promises?

>Was this true of the colonists in the American revolution?

yes, the american revolutionaries were absolutely terrorists. They used violence to revolt against their existing government.

> but because in the US there is already a government monopoly on force.

there is also already a monopoly on the use of force in the middle east by the governments of the respective governments. there are political ways to capture that control for an organization if they are politically motivated. If we were talking about a grassroots political movement trying to gain control of the government of a country, this would be a different conversation with a lot less about beheadings and rape, but we are talking about a theological military organization.