BOB: From WNYC in New York this is On the Media, Brooke Gladstone is off, I’m Bob Garfield. Here’s what happened this week.

Tape: [female announcer] the islamic state has released a second propaganda video featuring british journalist freelance john Cantlie in which Cantlie warns us efforts in Iraq and Syria could become another Vietnam

Tape: [female announcer] in developing news an Algerian group affiliated with the islamic state released a video today showing the beheading of Herve Gordel…

With the gruesome ISIS propaganda war in full force, the US State Department is ratcheting up its own media campaign to deter potential ISIS recruits. The slogan, a play on the old standby “Just Say No,” is an admonition to the vulnerable:  “Think Again Turn Away.”  And there’s an accompanying facebook page, twitter feed, and tumblr filled with the imagery of brutality. There’s also a video archly titled,  “Welcome to the Islamic State,” a mirthless parody of extremist recruitment tactics.

Film Sound

Against a backdrop of gore and violence, the video takes a stab at irony, instructing the viewer to “Run, don’t walk to ISIS…where you can learn useful skills...blowing up mosques...crucifying and executing muslims…” Rows of beheaded corpses plus deep sarcasm, courtesy of the United States Government.

HBO’s John Oliver.

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Oliver: ...and you are banking a lot on any potential militants understanding that is sarcasm. “You know what, I was just about to join ISIS but then I saw your very clever video. Telling me to join ISIS but using ironic juxtaposition of words and images to suggest that I should actually do the opposite!”

US intelligence and law enforcement agencies have identified about a dozen americans who have gone to fight for ISIS is Syria. In Britain the number of recruits is around 500. And in Britain, a home-grown cartoon character named Abdullah-X is the face of a more grassroots approach to anti-extremism. He challenges his peers to consider what Islam really espouses. The creator of Abdullah X (who asked to remain anonymous), says that his character confronts the young men who are most vulnerable to the ISIS message.

Creator of Abdullah X: We call someone like him at this stage, a jih-hobbyist or a keyboard warrior someone who is online, offline, discussing stuff in college canteens.

Voice 1: Its like the matrix and t’ing, they got us on lock, making us believe we free but we robots.

Voice 2: Exactly my brother, now we just got to get these men to follow, to listen to the cause. To the call, of revolution.

Creator of Abdullah X: The particular journey we're talking about abdullah X ends-up realizing that some of the rhetoric, narrative, ideology, the anger espoused Islamism is in direct contradiction to the core teachings of Islam. So he reverses the radicalization process by coming to realization.

BOB: and what you do is take koranic language that has been abused by extremists and try to reframe in the proper perspective.

Creator of Abdullah X: Yes, the whole Abdullah X platform is about not triny got recontextualizing the classic doctrine by trying to give it the context that befits it in the 21st century.

BOB: And you're not afraid to be kind of harsh on the subjects of this kind of appeal. You talk about how their lives and disappointing them. They're seeking greater meeting. And somehow they let themselves invest meaning in what is really just mindless violence and random hatred.

tape: Have you asked yourself sincerely what your actual magass is. Objective is. And if this is actually anything to do with Islam or protecting other people. If you have, then have you not to fund more constructive ways to support the innocent people of Syria compared to go out there and fight to simulate some video game that you feel you have reenact in real life.

Creator of Abdullah X: There is an element there that needs to be brought to the attention of these keyboard warriors who then live out the call of duty mantra which they're quite frustrated just playing the Playstation or the X-Box. And they believe that going out to somewhere like Syria actually fulfills that duty in a physical sense. So this camaraderie, this adventurism, this thrill seeking needs to be contextualized you have to look at some of the drivers and forces might compel to someone to do that. And unless you're going to talk to them direction it's a hopeless task.

BOB: Now this is not mere guest work on your part. It's not the result of focus group data. You've been there.

Creator of Abdullah X: Yeah. Yeah. I've been there. I thankfully never got to the stage where I needed to act upon the anger and hate that had been created in me. But the truth about this is from...uhh - the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in the mid-to-late 80s to Bosnia to Chechnya, to Kashmir to Iran/Iraq, Afghanistan. I've lived thru those, I understand what drives people to adopt this very harsh literalist interpretation of Islam. Yeah, when you're talking about why would you talk to people a certain way, it's only because I've bought the T-shirt and got a refund.

BOB: You were kind of pre-radicalized for the convenience of whoever was trying to recruit you.

Creator of Abdullah X: The same thing desperately hoping happens to a lot of people around the world who are at the moment typing strange things into Google search engine like 'how to go to Syria for jihad.' What happened to me was I saw thru the motives the legitimacy of the authority of the leaders of these groups. I saw that they were willing to send other people children off to death. While they sit comfortably and survey these things from the rear. Secondly, was that I had to offset some of the vitriolic rhetoric the hate and the anger that literalism and Islamism often espouses but finally coming to terms what does Islam say about things like the treatment of non-Muslims and Muslims. What does Islam say about my relationship as a British Muslim living in a secular country that is run by democracy. What rights do I have. What obligations to I have. Is it really as simple as saying there is no man made law that I can accept unless we impose God's law physically and potentially violently we can never rest. Is it all as simple as this narrative. And obviously after 1400 years of development, it's not that simple. And the last thing that happened as a result of that journey of critical questioning was that I finally managed to come to turn with my own sense of idetnity, my own sense of belonging my own sense of loyalty and duty. What I didn't believe in any more was just this narrative and what this narrative was making people do.

BOB: In my introduction I mentioned this State Dept. video.

Creator of Abdullah X: Yeah.

BOB: Which kind of unaccountably takes an ironic approach ridiculing the underlying premises of ISIS and other Muslim extremist organizations.

Creator of Abdullah X: To be honest, having seen the video, to me it just looks like an ISIS advertising video. The gore on its own and the violence it would make that young man say 'you know what, now I want to see a real ISIS video.' We also have to look on the role that Western government have played in exacerbating and often directly or indirectly contributing to the development of these very same risks and threats that we face from these networks. Griveances don't die. They get passed down from generation to generation. So we have to therefore ask ourselves, or the viewer would have to ask, 'how credible is the message of the US government when telling Muslims about other Muslims and their behavior and their actions..

BOB: Are you suggesting that whatever tactic is taken, whatever messaging tactic the fact that it comes from the US Department of State immediately renders it not only ineffective but putting gasoline on the fire of extremism.

Creator of Abdullah X: Your answer is in the communication sent form ISIL. The truth is they turn this into more campaigning for their own cause. The communication center very early Tuesday morning - from the appointment theologian that represents ISIS plays on heavily on the fact that the US President and other people around the world in positions of power and authority are apparently trying to tell Muslims which Muslims they should believe and which Muslims they should support.

BOB: You touched on one other thing I want to explore: unlike let's say catholicism where the Pope represents a central authority, there is not central theological authority in Islam. Is there any way for a third party to fill that yawning gap of authoritative interpretation to undermine these perversions of Islamic law at the source.

Creator of Abdullah X: For many years now there have been amazing efforts but mainstream Muslim organizations, individuals, Imams and clerics to make sure Muslim communities are resilient they understand what Islam's core message is. And they understand how to live in non-Muslim societies. The biggest problem we have when we talk about who speaks for Islam it is often Western media's almost no Islamophobic diatribe that does not highlight the grassroots efforts of mainstream law-abiding Muslim communities and those in authority over them -- it doesn't highlight that work. And even in the United States there are incredible efforts at community level. Always going on it's just that for some reason we like to show the monster and that's why Abdullah X was born.

BOB: I must ask. Are you funded directly or indirectly with I don't know MI6 or any UK agency?

Creator of Abdullah X: Abdullah X is a self-funded project of myself and a few like-minded people. I'd like it to remain that way. Abdullah X is a brother, Bob, who's just had some interesting experiences and what he's trying to do is he wants to show people that listen -- whether you're a US solider or you're out there in Racca somewhere or on the border between Syria and Iraq. You know you need to think twice sometime about your motives. What your intentions are. And who you really think you're doing this for. Abdullah X is a citizen of the world. God willing, he's not trying to toe any particular line. He's just trying to say that if a Muslim believes that a Muslim's life is governed by sanctity then the prophetic position is that a non-muslims is governed by the same sanctity as well.

BOB: Thank you very much.

Creator of Abdullah X: Thanks very much Bob.

BOB: The creator of Abdullah X an anti-extremist cartoon series. We will link to it on our website.