Bel, yes it is revolting that anyone should think Tuesday's events are cause for celebration, but something I have learned from talking to people here (and I don't mean about the current situation but over a long time) is that for people without the benefit of exposure to other cultures or a high degree of education it is very difficult to think of people who live thousands of miles away as real. They can be good and kind to the people around them or to strangers they meet but people the other side of the world don't realy exist. They're just images on a tv screen at best -- and images on a tv screen are always getting shot at, blown up and dying in all sorts of ways. It's a failure of imagination. We must do better than that because we know better. I hope that this medium we're experimenting with will spread so that everyone can feel that people the other side of the world are real and come to know and love them as we are doing. Given the bitterness of civil wars I may be deluding myself but I have to keep hoping, now above all.

Having said all that, once those who are responsible for this have been definitely identified they must be dealt with fairly but decisively however much we may understand what led them to it. In this case to understand all cannot be to forgive all, but the understanding must still be there.

I'm sorry if this is less than coherent.



Bingley

Bingley