Two significant news stories today that, at first, seem related in only a peripheral way, have come together in my thinking. The first is U.S. President Barack Obama's decisions not to release photos of Osama bin Laden's corpse, and to travel to New York today to lay a wreath at the site of the destroyed World Trade Centre. The second is the death of the last surviving veteran of World War I in Australia.
In a world of raging armed conflicts, devastating natural disasters, horrendous social and political upheavals, oppressive dictatorships and epidemic disease, it's amazing to me how much we can concentrate on whether or not we are entitled to see a blasted hulk of human flesh captured on a digital camera. Whether you believe the Americans or think they are lying (a discussion I don't want to get into), I find it reprehensible that people are actually celebrating murder like it's their daughter's fifth birthday party and she just opened all her presents. I find the lack of respect for the death of another human being to be galling.
And yes, the person in this case is bin Laden. I get that he's the world's most wanted man, a terrorist who inspired and supported the mass murder of thousands of people on U.S. soil in September 2001. He's not Mother Teresa. I'm not a fool, I know he's not a sympathetic figure. But what does it say when we can't even restrain ourselves enough to be more muted in response to news of his assassination?
Are we barbarians?
By comparison, the death of Claude Stanley Choules is receiving very little fanfare. He was the last known living combatant from the Great War, a conflict that was our first experience with total war. People like to say that our soldiers who fought in the trenches along the Western Front, and the ones who sacrificed so much to fight in the Second World War as well, did so in defense of our rights and freedoms. They were noble warriors, sent to do a dirty job that needed doing, and we should never forget their sacrifice.
Based on what I saw in the news media over the last couple of days with respect to bin Laden's assassination, however, I think we've already forgotten. The pursuit of liberty and peace is never easy, nor always tidy, but we should never try to attain it at the cost of our humanity. Photos or no, I believe the actions of people in the West are provocation enough for those who feel we are dancing on a dead man's grave.
Our history, principles and moral code, if we truly value them, would be better protected if we were less self-congratulatory and more sober in our response to bin Laden's murder. Claude Choules and others like him didn't risk their lives so we could behave like this. We should strive to do better than to stoop to the level of common thugs while seeking a higher purpose.
1 comment:
Greg, I remember many years ago watching Palestinians celebrating in the streets when they more-than-killed a couple of Israeli soldiers. It was sickening. I realized at that moment that what really separated those zealots from their enemies was that they could take joy in the suffering of others - not their politics, or their genes, but that joy. The way some in the Arab world celebrated 9/11 convinced me further of that. Seeing the reactions to this, well, I think that we've changed, as a society. I feel like the callousness and lack of respect terrorists have always shown has seeped into our culture, that we are giving in to hatred. Golda Meir said that what was needed for peace in the Middle East was for the Palestinians to love their children more than they hated the Israelis. I think the same applies here and now to the "war on terror". Which wins? Love for ourselves, our way of life and our children, or hatred for the people who threaten them? Your answer is in the reaction.
Thanks for writing this post.
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