Europe having its own 9/11 right now. Turn on the news.

[Kamil Prusakowski]

We in the western world think that Middle East is on some other distant
planet (Beirut attacks being interpreted as something natural, quotidian
and unimportant). Europe wakes up for a few seconds just to dive again into
a blissful inertia. The more Islamic fanaticism, the more neo-fascism, the
more gov control over everything, in the name of security. Those attacks
didn't destroy any symbols like 9/11 did and Europeans are extremely
sensitive about their 'holy sites'.

2015-11-14 20:50 GMT+01:00 David Kilroy <thesaintgodard at gmail.com>:

> You weren't flip, man.  You were commiserating, using the language to
> hand.  There's nothing inherently wrong with that.
>
> Over 14 years ago I blew up at a roomie for weeping to Elton John
> performing Candle In The Wind during that awful televised concert that
> embezzled proceeds...  I asked why she was crying, she said she was
> empathizing, and I snapped "This isn't empathy, this is television!"  The
> reality was, she'd broken up with her boyfriend of four years on the
> twelfth.  She needed to express her grief, whatever the direction.  I was
> wrong then, I'm just as wrong now.
>
> Laura was exactly right, it was my anger talking.  It was also fear.  My
> anger stems from the way america has framed the discussion for everyone.
> My fear...
>
> To me 9/11 is a doublethink keyword.  It conjures the Us v. Them,
> retrograde Christians vs. Muslims crusader schtick, and it's disingenous as
> hell because the actual problem is Violent Political Dissent.  There's no
> good way to combat that, I know.  Terrorism is nebulous.  But our branding
> of September 11th is directly tied in the public consciousness to the
> "muslim problem"-- nevermind that freethinking muslims have no interest in
> a global caliphate and blanch at the thought of murder, to say nothing of
> suicide.  Meanwhile we have our own ISIS bubbling, an underground of armed,
> predominantly racist, christian & eschatologist militias who desire nothing
> less than to establish their own caliphate.  (i.e. Dominion theology.)
> We're not talking about them.  We don't even want to *think* about them.
> But there will come a time when that discussion must happen, and when that
> comes to pass, I wonder how much empathy & goodwill the world will have
> left for the U.S.  Because they're not going to stop with shooting up
> churches, schools or theatres in this country.  They're going to drift out
> like spores and further infest a wounded world.
>
> That's what I'm afraid of.  My heart goes out to Paris, but it also goes
> out to Afghanistan, and Syria, and Mali, Niger, and Chad...  We haven't
> been a global village for some time, and I despair of us ever being one
> again.  I don't know where or even how this can end.
>
> I fear we're past the tipping point.
>
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