The Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt and the Fethullah Gulen Network of Turkey have shaped politics, economics, and society in their home countries in the last decades. Both networks had achieved considerable success until 2013 and have since been banned in their respective territories and faced immense pressure from their authoritarian governments. The Muslim Brotherhood and the Gulen Network are designated as terror organizations by their home countries: tens of thousands of their members have been imprisoned, assets seized, and others have gone into exile. Additionally, the groups’ charities, media outlets, and schools have been shuttered and their property confiscated. Despite the similar crackdowns, the reactions of the two groups differ. Unable to obtain a voice through political or civic participation, some members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood considered splitting into radical factions and resorting to violence. However, within the Gulen Network, there is no discussion of using violence, despite the fact that more than 50 thousand of them were veteran police and military personnel who were purged by the government, who could quickly resort to violence. The literature on political violence stresses the lack of available political and civilian channels; however, despite this lack of possible channels, the Gulen network still does not consider violence. This paper argues that the nature of organizational structure (populist vs. elitist), political discourse, expectations, and experiences correlate with whether a network resorts to violence or not. This paper adopts the qualitative method, including content analysis of official statements, social media posts, and the media outlet of the networks and focus-group interviews with the Gulen and the Muslim Brotherhood networks.