It’s very tempting to blame yourself when something bad happens.

However, what took place in Paris on Friday night wasn’t our fault. When I say, “our fault”, I mean you, me, the people eating and drinking in those restaurants, the people outside the Stade de France, the people in that theatre and the people of other western democracies.

Historically, the left has been about social justice, egalitarianism, universalism and liberation from religious dogma. Why do I bring this up? Because I’ve noticed that after every recent act of terrorism – including the terrible events in Paris on Friday night – the first thing a percentage on the left seem to do is tell us what we did to deserve this.

The bodies of those poor bastards, who simply went out to enjoy themselves, weren’t even cold before we were being told that humans in the west should pretty much expect to die like this because of what our dreadful governments have done.

“Of course they attack us, what do we expect?”, wrote one person who I follow on Twitter.

Others were quick cite the racist discrimination against Arabs and Africans in France as a reason for what was unfolding. To me, that’s pretty racist in itself. It implies that Arabs and Africans lack the basic moral compass needed to know that gunning down scores of people is pretty bad. Obviously, when you then ask why previous generations of the racially abused didn’t take Kalashnikov’s into rock concerts to murder loads of people, you don’t get an answer.

At this point, I feel the need to say that I’m not a supporter of western foreign policy, and I think racism and bigotry are still a big problem. However, the idea that westerners have to now accept that they are going to be given a taste of the fear that people from other parts of the world have to withstand – simply because of what their governments have their sent militaries off to do – is self-loathing nonsense.

I’ve read a lot over the past few days and the trend I’ve seen emerge looks like this.

One side, predominantly the right, say that we need to shut ourselves down from certain foreign people because they can’t be trusted not to kill us. The other side, predominantly the left, say that this is our fault because of the wars ‘we’ve’ been doing.

Both of them are wrong.

Western foreign policy did not create Islamic extremism. It isn’t responsible for adulterers being stoned to death in Indonesia or secular bloggers being murdered in Bangladesh. If we continue to blame ourselves for the actions of Jihadists we let down moderate Muslims, who are ironically the people they actually harm the most.

That doesn’t mean, however, that the actions of those who lead western countries haven’t helped create an environment where Islamic fundamentalism can breed. Governments acting in our name have done some horrendous things and made huge mistakes of which most of us accept, but the average citizen who lives in a western democracy doesn’t have to apologise (or hate themselves) for what those who are supposed to lead us have done.

Ironically, the biggest outcry against the Iraq war came from within European countries. Many of those who died on Friday will have undoubtedly also been against that war. What happened in Paris was an inhumane assault but our leaders decisions to invade countries doesn’t even come close to justifying the murder of those innocent civilians in Paris.

It’s about time that some of us on the left regained our senses and remembered the liberal, democratic and enlightened foundations our movement was built upon. Whilst we blame the societies we live in, the right will continue to make headway with the anti-immigrant rhetoric that only creates further tension amongst our communities, which is ironically the very thing that groups like ISIS want to see happen.

Time would be better spent acknowledging, understanding, and helping those who want to tackle the extremist ideology within Islam than battering ourselves and our fellow Europeans for the dreadful things powerful people have done in our name