Radicalized

I'm having a hard time watching the national network news.... 

again....

This time it's the word, radicalized. 

I was recently in Boston. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was in the sentencing phase of his trial for the Boston bombing. 

As I listened to the news, I couldn't help but notice that the newscasters were talking about Tsarnaev being "radicalized" by his older brother, and perhaps that would impact the penalty phase of his trial. 

When someone is radicalized, it implies passivity. That somehow, over breakfast, someone was talked into something, pressured to hate people, and passively they became a hater. This term has had a major appearance in recent years with regards to ISIS and terrorism. Speaking about radicalization with regards to terrorism implies that the terrorists were somehow persuaded and are ultimately not responsible.

I started to think, this week was also the 20th anniversary of the Oklahoma City Bombing. 

Did anyone ever talk about Timothy McVeigh, the bomber, being "radicalized?" Never.

Why can't we admit that "some people" do "bad things" and they are responsible for those bad things?