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On the morning after Paris
10 years ago
a!
I am sorry if this is one of many journals about the attacks, but I feel the need to post something about this.
I heard of the attacks from my mother, who ran upstairs, panicked, telling me there was a really large attack going on, and I immediately switched to the live BBC coverage. I saw the numbers of dead and just thought: "Oh my god, those bastards". I wasn't even thinking who I meant when I said those bastards, if I meant just the attackers, or the ISIS that was later known to claim responsibility, or terrorism in general or religion or just all of humanity really. I was gripped by fear, fear of 'it' happening to 'us', and fear needs to assign blame, preferably on the largest possible group it can generalise.
And I mean, as I was reading about it, I realised that the attacks were literally still taking place. Like, there were literally still people being killed in the Bataclan concert hall. The usual mode of engagement of wanting to analyse and assign your own world view onto a fluid situation like this just does not work. People tend to want to immediately go: "Oh if we had just done everything the way I feel the world should be then this would not have happened!" and that idea is always going to be flawed.
It took a great deal of conscious thinking to remind myself that the majority of actions that occurred in Paris today were not acts of terror. They were not acts of hate and intolerance. They were acts of heroism and openness. #porteouverte was just one of many examples of Parisian solidarity being shown to the world. And we should not forget the hard work of the emergency respondents and common bystanders who helped the wounded, the confused, the terrified, the lost, just anyone really.
What I mean to say is, that the coming days, how we respond to this tragedy is going to be a reflection of us as a single humanity. Will we assign blame on Islam, and on the millions of refugees who are in Europe now because they fleed from this kind of daily terror of ISIS? I hope not, but I fear with all of my heart that this is going to lead to even more Islamophobia in Europe. If we choose to respond to this situation with hostility towards all muslims and we use this situation as an excuse to turn away countless people fleeing the horrid violence from ISIS, we do a great disservice to the heroism and solidarity that Paris showed last night and to all of humanity.
And that's when we let them win.
I heard of the attacks from my mother, who ran upstairs, panicked, telling me there was a really large attack going on, and I immediately switched to the live BBC coverage. I saw the numbers of dead and just thought: "Oh my god, those bastards". I wasn't even thinking who I meant when I said those bastards, if I meant just the attackers, or the ISIS that was later known to claim responsibility, or terrorism in general or religion or just all of humanity really. I was gripped by fear, fear of 'it' happening to 'us', and fear needs to assign blame, preferably on the largest possible group it can generalise.
And I mean, as I was reading about it, I realised that the attacks were literally still taking place. Like, there were literally still people being killed in the Bataclan concert hall. The usual mode of engagement of wanting to analyse and assign your own world view onto a fluid situation like this just does not work. People tend to want to immediately go: "Oh if we had just done everything the way I feel the world should be then this would not have happened!" and that idea is always going to be flawed.
It took a great deal of conscious thinking to remind myself that the majority of actions that occurred in Paris today were not acts of terror. They were not acts of hate and intolerance. They were acts of heroism and openness. #porteouverte was just one of many examples of Parisian solidarity being shown to the world. And we should not forget the hard work of the emergency respondents and common bystanders who helped the wounded, the confused, the terrified, the lost, just anyone really.
What I mean to say is, that the coming days, how we respond to this tragedy is going to be a reflection of us as a single humanity. Will we assign blame on Islam, and on the millions of refugees who are in Europe now because they fleed from this kind of daily terror of ISIS? I hope not, but I fear with all of my heart that this is going to lead to even more Islamophobia in Europe. If we choose to respond to this situation with hostility towards all muslims and we use this situation as an excuse to turn away countless people fleeing the horrid violence from ISIS, we do a great disservice to the heroism and solidarity that Paris showed last night and to all of humanity.
And that's when we let them win.
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Doveen
~doveen
I agree and second this by saying: While the usual quotes with the key words: hope, Humanity, hero, goodness, heart, etc are very nice and comforting, my biggest hope is that this won't end like the rest of the attacks like this: Sayign the qoutes with mentioned keywords and moving on. Self defence and revenge are not the same, but people are so afriad of the former turning in to the latter, they don't even try. And THAT is our biggest weakeness. We can make mistakes, but that possibility can't chain us.
ilbv
~ilbv
We stand for Paris, we are not afraid http://www.furaffinity.net/view/18244060/
