Where has all our compassion gone for all those that are of a different culture than we are? Personally I believe it is our fear as Americans. Especially when something as devastating and horrific as the Boston bombings were. I was deeply troubled by the out pour of hate that I was hearing from the majority of the American people after the Boston bombings.
Once one of the news outlets said that it was a man/men of brown skin. It was on after that. All the prejudice and bigotry of the majority of the American people were fueled. I was hearing about beatings and foul mouthed racial slurs toward our Muslim brothers and sisters. On facebook I would read posts such as one dead one to kill. At this point let me make a full disclosure, I will admit, that for a brief moment, I to was thinking to myself we should kill the bastard. Not because of the color of his skin, because at that time I did not know and it didn't matter to me, because I just wanted swift "justice" or vigilante justice as it were.
Once I calmed down and the initial shock of what happened stop consuming me, I realized that it was just wrong to feel this way about another human being. Now let me say without a doubt this does not mean that I take lightly what happened to the victims of the bombing because I do not . In fact, I have such compassion for those families of the loved ones who died and those suffering at the hands of what these two young misguided men did.
Fear , bigotry and hate must not guide us. We must not punish those that are of the same faith of the two misguided young men. Also we must NOT punish and take out our fear and frustration on the Muslim people in our community. It is as though most of Americans group all people that are not of American descent into one group and do horrific hate crimes to this group. It is so past time to stop doing this.
If fact, President Obama stated in his speech last night exactly what I am saying in this blog. Here is an excerpt of that speech: The American spirit includes staying true to the unity and diversity that makes us strong like no other nation in the world. In this age of instant reporting, tweets and blogs there is a temptation to latch on to any information and sometimes to jump to conclusions, but when a tragedy like this happens with public safety is at risk and the stakes so high it is important that we do this right. That is why we have investigations, that is why we relentlessly gather the facts, that's why we have courts and that is why we take care not to rush to judgment not about the motivations of these individuals and certainly not about entire groups of people. After all one of the things that makes America one of the greatest nations on earth but also one of the things that makes Boston such a great city is that we welcome people from all around the world, people of every faith, people of every ethnicity, from every corner of the globe. So as we continue to learn more about why and how this tragedy happened let's make sure that we sustain that spirit.
My wife Kathy and I live in a diverse neighborhood and I must say I absolutely love it here. I feel so safe and so protected by all my neighbors, because we all look out for one another. We have such a melting pot of different people here. Different cultures and ethnicity. I look at it as a way to learn different cultures and to embrace our differences.
The one surviving Boston Bomber is a young man of 19 years old. Just a kid. Why should we not show him compassion just as we show our fallen Americans and our fallen Chinese exchange student. He was misguided just as the majority of our American kids are today. He followed his older brother because that is what he always had done. I for one am grateful that they caught him and he is alive. Not to mention how scared he probably was. He saw his brother killed right in front of his eyes. I would be scared to. Fear made him run and fear got him caught. Perhaps he can give us needed information and get some mental help for what he has done.
These are my thoughts and feelings from Jillsville.
It's not possible to know for sure what goes on in another person's mind. We see actions and then often make judgments based on what is visible. It seems to be a widespread human trait to divide the world up into us and them, but that doesn't mean that it has to be that way forever. We're capable of doing it differently. Thanks for the thoughtfulness that went into this blog.
ReplyDeleteJill, you just said everything that Em and I have been talking about ever since the younger brother was captured. Now I hear a senator proposing using torture to make this 19 year old kid talk. Yes, what he did was heinous, but I'm not at all convinced he's a "monster" or "evil." I rather believe he probably was led astray by his brother who, in turn, had been led astray during his six months in Russia (but was much older and should have been capable of making better decisions). There are a lot of people who are "pure Americans" who could, and would do the same given the chance. How about the psychological torture perpetrated on a woman contemplating abortion by making her watch intravaginal ultrasounds, the "spare the rod" fundamentalists who torture children to "grow 'em up right?" There are a lot of cruel people out there, and not all of them are of different cultures! Thank you for voicing so well what I have been feeling!
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