Reply #6: If you think that's incomprehensible... [View All]

[mojowork_n]

...how do you suppose the people on the streets in Baghdad feel? Or those in Darfur, trying to keep one step ahead of the Janjaweed militias?

Only 30 some people killed? That's not such a horrible day, it may be less horrible than any day of the past week, or month. In the Gulags in the Soviet Union, I think the joke went, 'anything that does not kill you ... will ... probably kill you next week.'

I don't mean to downplay the tragedy, or diminish it, or marginalize it. I'm just trying to step out of the box, with comparisons to different contexts. Americans are just too spoiled. Our primary societal role -- consumer cattle -- makes us over-prone to look for simply packaged solutions/answers. Add several layers of media over-saturation on top of that expectation, in a context that questions personal safety, and people's first instinct is to run for cover. (Or in this case, a "box".)