Nigeria's citizens and its insurgents (from Photo-essay by J. Verini and E. Kashi)

Excerpt from the 26-page article in Nov. 2013 issue of National Geographic (titled "The War for Nigeria"):
"Such is the polyphony of interaction in Nigeria -- 'affectionate extortion,' I heard it called.  In a country that's endured a civil war, six military coups, two assassinations of heads of state, and at least three crippling domestic insurgencies in just over 50 years of existence, and where contempt for leadership has hardened into a perverse kind of civic responsibility, this mixture of menace and generosity, officiousness and humor . . . is indicative of a certain flippancy, part of that Nigerian braggadocio.  It's also a way of keeping sane. . .to that end it orders Nigerians' complex perspective on sedition.  They condemn Boko Haram and see its hypocrisy.  As one soldier, a Muslim, said to me while guarding a church on Palm Sunday, "They say Western education is wrong.  But that book you're reading, how was it made?  That pen you're using, how was it made?  That gun you have, where was it made?"  But they pay Boko Haram a grudging deference too.  They know well the frustration that would drive someone to take up arms against the state.  This deference takes subtle forms.  On Kano street corners vendors sell DVDs of insurgent attacks downloaded from the Internet.  Saying Boko Haram aloud is discouraged, but you can refer to the Boko Boys, of BH, as though it were some hot rap act. . ."