I don't usually write blogs like this. So many opinions clutter up the Internet and I don't expect mine to be different or even relevant. I wasn't in Norway this weekend. I am not invested or involved in any big way. I want to write this, though. So here goes.
On Friday Norway was attacked twice, one man being apparently responsible for both of the tragedies. The number of dead is currently ninety two and they're still searching for bodies in the rubble at Oslo and in the lake at Utøya.
I don't know if I have the right to be, all of my Norwegian friends are thankfully safe, but I'm really fucking angry. There's something inexplicably personal about indiscriminate attacks.
Much has been made of the suspected gunman's beliefs. Every time this kind of atrocity occurs we want to know why. We want to get as close as possible to understanding. It's only human. Before Anders Behring Breivik was arrested many discussing the tragedies on Twitter, and most notably The Sun "newspaper", made the assumption they were orchestrated by Islamic extremists. This no longer appears to be the case as Breivik is a right wing Christian.
It doesn't matter what people like Breivik believe. There are plenty of people who fit his profile: people who believe in Jesus, read Nineteen Eighty Four, have a Facebook account and identify as right-wingers. The difference is that Breivik is a murderer. He is a murderer before he is a Christian conservative. He is a maniac. He is a monster. The same argument applies to Islamic extremists. There are millions of Muslims who happen not to be suicide bombers. It doesn't matter if a terrorist is a Christian, a Muslim, a video gamer or whatever group we happen to fear this week. Terrorists often have strong beliefs but most people who share these beliefs express them by writing to local government, composing political songs, arguing with strangers in pubs, whatever. Most people don't go out and shoot dozens of innocent children. To connect the belief to the terrible act is dangerous to the many people who happen to fall into the same group as the monster. It's also an insult to his victims because it serves as an attempt to justify the way in which they died. There is no way to justify this. What a horrible day.
I felt tempted to write something too but in the end I couldn't think of anything that would say half of what was going around in my head or add anything to the vast amount of comments floating around already. You've done a pretty good job though. Did you read Charlie Brooker's article?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/24/charlie-brooker-norway-mass-killings
It was a very carefully planned and orchestrated attack with the aim of getting maximum impact and highlighting his cause. All this discussion of why he did it is doing exactly that. The media are putting him in a pretty good position to become a martyr.
Last I heard he was pleading insanity. I doubt he will get it though. It doesn't take much time to see how much planning and thought went into this. There's something far too cold and detatched about it all. I think that's the thing that makes it all the more horrific.
I think Charlie Brooker pretty much nailed it. I also agree that the majority of the media have handled the tragedy terribly, even if you ignore all the Al Qaeda rubbish.
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