Tough Week

To quote President Obama, “It’s been a tough week.”. It’s hard to believe how much news coverage of one event you can fit into one week, and I’m not sure what is left to be said regarding the terrorist attack at the Boston Marathon. Just the same, in light of the gravity of the situation, to discuss anything else this week would be as absurd as calling a press conference to throw a temper tantrum over a failed gun control bill.

Despite the loss of life and limb in Boston, there was a much larger bomb, with much more loss of life and property than the ones the terrorists set off. It received only passing attention as the nation was riveted by the events unfolding in Boston. I speak of course of the accidental fertilizer bomb that devastated the small town of West, Texas. On any other week, this would have been a bigger story, but still not a huge one. Clearly, the size of the explosion does not dictate the size of the story. The number of lives lost does not correlate with the level of the sense of tragedy in the public at large. No one is gathering in West to sing the national anthem or to chant “USA! USA!”

No, I’m not trying to lay a guilt trip with the short shrift that the fertilizer plant tragedy received this week. Indeed, President Obama did well to make mention of it in his speech. There is no guilt due in being distracted from one tragedy by another. But when the smaller of the tragedies is the one that is the bigger story, the more captivating story, one wonders… why? That’s it, isn’t it? The networks have let us know in infinite detail exactly what happened in Boston, how the terrorists performed their heinous act; they provided us with ticking timelines of events as to when every important one occurred. The endless news cycle repeatedly has answered the questions of what, where, when, and how; but they have been ultimately unable to answer the question utmost on our minds. Why?

We understand catastrophes like the one in West, Texas. The universe is random; bad things happen; people make mistakes; there are accidents… “why” doesn’t really enter into it unless you get all metaphysical. Most people just shake their heads, say a prayer for the victims, and move on with their lives freshly aware of their own mortality. But Boston was different. 9-11 was different. These were not random; there was intention. It is intention we can not understand, seemingly inhuman and demonic. What would make a 19 year old with a life full of privilege and promise throw that life away to kill a little boy and two women? What hatred can be so powerful toward people you don’t even know that would justify spending hours creating devices to tear off their limbs? What heart of darkness would shun the joys of youth for pursuit of mindless murder? …Why?

We are wondrously made creatures, and the complexity of our biological framework is dwarfed by the infinite intricacy of our emotional and spiritual design. All of our emotions serve a purpose when they are warranted, even the negative ones, “and a time for every purpose, under heaven”. The irony of the sanctimonious “Coexist” bumper sticker on the SUV the terrorists hijacked should serve to show us that it is never that simple. We do not live in Paradise, and there unfortunately are always enemies at the gate. We can’t always tolerate, we can’t always have peace, we can’t always be loving. Negative emotions such as anger, hatred, retribution, and indignation exist for a purpose, and employed appropriately and judiciously in a controlled fashion they can effectively right wrongs. But as a fist can be used for self-defense, so also it can be used for assault. Evil men have often perverted religion to direct these negative emotions toward those they considered their enemies. Eventually the perversion becomes the core of their creation; and when the core is hatred, death, and violence, neither man nor God is in control; the darkness is.

A common denominator for all these atrocities seems to be sub-dividing people into categories of chosen ones versus sub-humans. The white Europeans were the chosen ones, the native americans were savages, the slaves were sub-human. The Inquisition considered those of their “faith” the chosen ones, and the heathen needed to be purged. The Nazis believed that the Aryans were the chosen race, and so their extermination of the Jewish “mud-people” was justified as the “final solution”. Pro-choice advocates are both the chosen and the choosing, and the little “cluster of cells”, “fetus”, or whatever you choose to call “it”… well… not chosen.

IMHO: The reaction of the nation after the second terrorist was apprehended was one of joy and nationalism. It was reminiscent of the reaction in the days following 9-11, and I suppose that is this cloud’s silver lining. Experience tells us that this unity will not last and we will again return to our animosity for our brethren, in some quarters sooner than others. The outlandish desire for some to prefer that these terrorists had been from homegrown groups shows that misplaced hatred exists apart from the terrorist organizations. Political differences ought not cause us to deny the humanity of our adversaries, we just see things differently. Fortunately, wrong-headedness does not disqualify us from being Americans. The anger and hatred visible in the political debate in this country borders on extremist religious fervor, and the end result will be division and darkness regardless of who is victorious. Whatever lessons we learn from Boston we should acknowledge this: No creed of conviction or convenience ought cause us to view any person as less than human. Monsters masquerading as humans are rare; assume that people are not sub-human. Life is sacred, and the value of humanity surpasses the divisions we have in this dark world.