This might be a long one, and I apologize in advance for that. Also, if I get hit points on my account for this, I don't really care. I have something to say.
This morning, when I heard on the news that it was a guy with an Arabic-sounding name who committed the bombing, I swear to God I thought to myself, "Muslim". I was SO ashamed, totally disgusted with myself. As if my brain were just on autopilot and thinking that it would have been a Muslim to conduct those bombings. Kids, don't do what my stupid head did. I know it's hard, because every single day in the media, there are those stupid little micro-aggressions that add up to a really big problem, directed at the minority group of the moment. Every century picks a new minority group to pick on: disabled people, gay people, people who just aren't white, anyone of a different religion, and so on. This decade, it's Muslims...and a whole bunch of others (thanks Trump), but mostly Muslims. We brand people as "other" or as "enemy" or as "different" in the negative sense, but it's these labels that CREATES the so-called "other" or "enemy". People honestly don't get this and it's REALLY annoying, but it's like saying to someone that they're a piece of shit. The more you say it, the more it gets ground into that person's head, and, despite whether it's true or not, the more the person will start to believe it. It's called the "thousand paper cuts" phenomenon: a paper cut is one little thing, but then cut and cut and cut away until BAM, you've bled out, or are so injured that you just can't function. I am NOT condoning what happened in Manchester. Not in the slightest. I think that people who attack others and especially children or animals (i.e. groups that can't defend themselves) are terrible. However, it may indeed be the case that they are terrible because they themselves have suffered greatly. Think about what's gone on in Syria: can you honestly imagine being so incredibly oppressed by your government that such a large proportion of people choose to leave a country? It's very difficult for anyone living in Europe (at least Western Europe) and North America to imagine this, because we have always lived lives of relative ease compared to those who live in war-torn nations. It's called white privilege. Whites, myself included, have had the privilege to live in these relatively peaceful, orderly nations, but very much at the expense of nations in which these privileges are not at all present. I've made this point on another page before, but it is fear that most often makes us revert to the mindset that we must kill in order to live. But why should we have to kill in order to live? I see no reason for that other than those reasons that are found in a mind that has been warped by fear: fear of death, fear of retribution, fear of the pyramidal structure that our world has become, and so forth. And it will be fear that makes people retaliate, and blame the "other", while in reality we create that "other" by aiming guns rather than reaching out hands. I do NOT believe that this issue is beyond repair, mind you. It's going to take some doing, but for God's sake, people, I have just two things to ask of you, and this applies not only to anyone here who cares but to the world generally, if I may be egotistical enough for a moment to make such a bold request...
1. Put down the fecking guns
2. Stop saying "us versus them" and "the other" and "the enemy"; it's not helpful
And I'm done. Like I say, I don't give a damn if I get bombarded for this. People who feel the need to perform violent attacks are only ever doing so out of fear, which comes out as aggression because we as humans know of no other way to deal with fear. And that's all I have to say about that, except to express my condolences to anyone here who's from Manchester and witnessed this shit go down first hand. No amount of money or compassion towards the families that now suffer could ever compensate for such losses, ever.