Monday, April 15, 2013
The truly sad aspect of the Boston Marathon bombing today is that it won't change anything. The perps will likely be caught and either killed or put away for a long time. If they did it for some as yet unstated cause, that cause will continue to exist beyond them. "Preventative" measures (false faux word)will be instituted. Politicians will wax eloquent about what caused or enabled this. But no hearts will change. No laws will pass. Six months or a year from now the next "terrorist" incident will occur, and we'll be back to square one.
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2 comments:
I'll not dispute your assertion or analysis. I think it is telling that this event has resulted in this post - it is one of a string of tragedies we as a people but also you specifically have had to really face (not hide our eyes).
I wonder,however, if this is not the natural outcome of a sheltered and desensitizing lifestyle in which media saturates us to the point we delve deeper into those entertainments and distractions involving the same level of atrocity, or worse, all of which perpetuates the desensitization.
Said simply, I wonder if the change that needs to occur is one of facing the realities of life: evil exists, evil will occur. I don't know. Historically philosophers and stump-standers and coffee shop pundits all get to a point where there is an answer, but its acceptance means acceptance of an imperfect solution which demands we live in a space of uncertainty or dissatisfaction. We as Americans definitely dislike dissatisfaction.
As an example, well, I think Anselm gave the greatest proof for the existence of God (that is known as the ontological argument), but it requires we accept the conclusion that either Faith and not Reason supplies knowledge of God's existence, or we accept we have not Faith to supply that knowledge - historically the skeptics, dissatisfied with this answer, have defaulted to the position Reason has to supply that knowledge, and the proof is found wanting.
With social tragedy such as this dissatisfaction with the fact evil exists leads us to eschew facing life lived with the unsettling reality ever haunting our daily experience.
I will point this out, and this is perhaps most important: we ask police officers to live with this knowledge every day; we ask soldiers to bear the weight of this truth. we ask them to stare at this horrid reality on a daily level, and to remain professional and productive.
I do not know if for you there is a lesson or many in these observations, but there are lessons. I think firstly the reasons of why an officer elects to be an officer, what the nature of the calling they feel may be, could and should serve to framework our civilian and personal responses : they feel called to protect and to serve.
What are our emotional motivations towards others? Are we driven to protect? To care for? Are we even considering where we fit in the lives of others suffering this experience?
Maybe change might occur if we all began thinking in these ways?
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