We live in
London, and since yesterday (that would be the 23d of May2013 as I type), there
has been little talk but of the recent murder of a soldier in Woolwhich, by two
people (OK, they are technically merely suspects at this time but stayed on the
scene explaining why they had done it, don’t deny it at all, and have been
videotaped. Let’s assume that they did do it).
There has
been a lot of comments, too, as is always the case in those internet days. Much
of it, alas, on the lines of the scandal that “such people” (clearly meaning
Muslims, brown or black, or any combination of those) were in Britain, that
they should all be instantly deported.
Maybe
mainstream media is no longer able to moderate its own forums (but then what
about disabling comments?), though that is an abdication of responsibility.
What was in the reports themselves was a deluge of claims that the deceased was
an absolute hero (indeed he was sporting a jumper calling for “support for
heroes”), and about the savagery of the attacks.
Indeed,
savage it was. He was first deliberately run over by a car, then the car
occupants came out wielding hatchets and stabbed him, later apparently
attempting to behead the dead body. This man was the father of a two year-old.
One can imagine the shock to its family, the sudden loss of a father to such a
young soul. But even if he had had no family or friend, the very thought of
that sudden attack, of that painful (however fast it must have, hopefully,
been) is highly disturbing..
...so is the
thought of every single one of the hundreds of thousands of deaths in
Afghanistan, and probably over a million in Iraq, a perspective that was never
mentioned in any of the reporting I’ve seen, even though this was explicitly
stated by the murderers as the reason for their act. They even apologised to
the witnesses for having seen that, then said that it was direct retaliation
for the scores of civilian deaths from bombs and drone attacks, almost daily,
“over there”. The reaction to that has usually been that this proved that they
were insane.
Let me make
it clear that I regret his passing, that I wished that no political cause were
fought by direct violence (yes, and a pony, too. I know…). But let’s notice
their choice of a target.
It was a
soldier. Who had served in Afghanistan.
In
comparison, many civilians are killed “over there”. Actually, civilians are the
huge majority. Weddings, funerals and schools have been particularly hit
–because they are gatherings.
He was one
(yes, one. That is one too many, but one too many is a thought that should have
been applied over a million times “over there”) soldier, and one who served in
a war of aggression. Yes, he was killed in the UK, but his service had taken
him where he was not welcome. Where he was not defending his country: neither
Afghanistan nor Iraq attacked the UK. The same cannot be said in reverse.
It seems
from the reactions that much of the strength of the outrage was because the
crime took place in the UK, at home, whereas the other deaths are “over there”.
Well, guess what –to the local populations, “over there” IS home.
Could it
also be because the victim was white? To the extent that there is outrage
expressed at the presence in Afghanistan (you will find that in the press, just
not now), it tends to be because of the costs in money and British lives. Yet
those are dwarfed by the local casualties (and the wreckage to the local
economies, but people’s lives are much more important to me). Look at the
soldiers usually unchallenged characterisation as “heroes”. Are they really?
Yes, they put themselves at risk –but as the stats show, they are responsible
for innumerably more deaths than their ranks suffer from. And the deaths that
they cause are in attack, the ones they suffer are from defense of the
territory. Is that what heroism is about?
Michael
Moore, in his usual provocative style, put it that way:” I am outraged that we
can't kill people in other counties without them trying to kill us!.”
Yet, as far
as I could see, this kind of perspective is totally absent from the media. I
did notice (in comments, not the articles themselves) the meme that Blair had
blood on his hands –but that was for allegedly letting “those people” (Muslims,
brown…) into the country so they would vote Labour. Not engaging in a
destructive endeavour in countries that posed no threat to his. Absurdly, it
seems from the media that the fact that the victim was a soldier is considered
as making the crime much worse –yet it would have seemed obvious to me that
choosing to become a soldier would entail an accepted increase in the risk of
violent death.
So by all
mean let he (whose name is public –but I am reluctant to name him until the
same honour is given to all the other victims) be mourned, let us deplore his
passing and even more so its brutality. But let the hordes of other victims be
mourned, too. And when judging (let alone castigating all their communities)
the perpetrators, let us not forget the context of their act: in retaliation to
the indiscriminate killing of many thousands, they have killed one soldier. Let
us not, in our outrage, forget the outrage of those who were on the receiving
end of our actions.
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