Why my Heart Weeps for Paris

Note: 

this post was hard to write. 

It may very well be hard to read. 

I like to say that Nosy Nora's favourite word is "suggest" ... 

I would like to suggest that you think about whether or not you want to read this particular post. It discusses atrocities that people commit against each other. My images are stark and may have an impact on you. It is potentially triggering to read - it was certainly triggering to write. 

I will completely understand your discretion at choosing whether or not to read this post. 

Respectfully yours, 

April 

I firmly believe that one atrocity does not outweigh another. Weeping for the horrors in Paris does not mean NOT weeping for the horrors in Beirut. Humans have always committed harm against each other. It is our deepest flaw - the belief that two wrongs can make a right. 

Revenge, retaliation, and not even knowing "who started it".

As a young child, I was exposed to horrors around the world enacted over the last 70 years of global history. Explicitly taught and shown what happened, what WAS happening, and what could happen. Taught of the horrors as a means to prevent their recurrence. At night I curled up in a ball in my bed and cried silent tears over lives lost and horrific violence committed in countries I had never been to - some I had never heard of. 

At 10, I would wake from nightmares about what might be happening to Nelson Mandela in prison. At 11, I was taken on a class trip to see a graphic movie about the life and brutal death of Stephen Biko and I would wake in the night fearful of what might happen next - of what could, or in my mind WOULD, happen next. 

I think it is worth me writing about here in this space that I have created for myself. To finally speak what I have carried around in my heart for more than 30 years. 

Humans can be awful. Humans can be beautiful and wonderful and kind and compassionate and vulnerable and strong and weak and brave and incredible and sad and lonely and jealous and mindful and just plain human. 

Humans can also be convinced that they are in the right. That violence is the only solution. That nothing else will work. Humans are flawed. 

The attacks on the Twin Towers in New York was horrific. Thousands and thousands and thousands of lives changed, affected, or lost. Continued effects and pain and trauma haunt the USA. I ache for their pain. 

And at the same time, on that day, I thought about the concept of NYMBY - Not In My Back Yard. 

Thousands and thousands and thousands of lives have been changed, affected, or lost around the world over many years. The sudden and unexpected attack on American soil with the loss of so many lives at once was ... there isn't a word to describe how awful it was without sounding flippant or dismissive. My reaction to 9/11 was no different than my reaction every time there is an attack anywhere in the world - whether it is a suicide bomber, a drone bombing, a massacre in a movie theatre or a school, war, genocide ... in my mind, they are all atrocities. They are all worthy of the tears I weep in my heart. 

The reaction of the West to the attacks in Paris are very much rooted in NYMBY. The Middle East faces this unsettled violent loss so often that it has become "expected". It has become "the norm". An attack in France is shocking and terrifying to the West because we think of ourselves as peaceful nations. We don't consider ourselves to be part of the flawed and fearful parts of humanity that we have othered. Hearing of the deaths of innocent people in Iraq is not shocking. Hearing of the deaths of innocent people in France is terrifying. 

To me there is no difference except that we have become desensitized to horrors that are far enough removed from our realities that we have convinced ourselves of NYMBY. We have convinced ourselves that the individuals in Western society who suddenly murder innocent people in a massacre in a movie theatre in Colorado, 

a school in Columbine, 

a University in Montreal

 - that these are the acts of individuals with mental health challenges. 

That horrific attacks from one nation against another could not possibly happen here. 

And yet it did. 

I weep for the people in Paris who survived the attacks. I weep for the ones who were murdered. I weep for those left behind. I weep for the fears of France declaring it an act of war. I weep for the potential repercussions. I weep for the people who believe so strongly in a common enemy that they are willing to take so many lives as well as their own. It is awful, and painful, and something that I can't possibly ever understand. 

I weep for the children of Soweto who were murdered by police in June of 1967 when they protested Afrikaans being the language of instruction in schools. 

I weep for the over 1,700,000 Tutsi Rwandans who were slaughtered over a period of 100 days by Hutu Rwandans - military, police, and civilians, encouraged to wipe out the Tutsi people in 1994. Roughly 7 people every hour ...  My heart aches for the 45,000 Tutsi people, including children and infants, hiding in a technical school, who were slaughtered all in one day and dumped into a mass grave - a volleyball court was built on top to hide what had happened. The school is now a genocide museum. 

I weep for the victims, survivors, and families of those systematically murdered during the Holocaust. 

I weep for the missing and murdered Aboriginal women in our own country of Canada. 

I weep for the people of Beirut. 

I weep for Stephen Biko (famous for his slogan "black is beautiful") who was brutally murdered while in police custody in 1977 - the year I was born. He was declared a terrorist by the South African government, because of his activism against apartheid, detained and beaten until he died of a brain hemorrhage. 

I weep for heart break and sadness and murder and terror and acts of violence that I will never comprehend. 

Humans have the capacity for such love and such hate. 

It terrifies me. 

As a teacher, one of the main focuses of my teaching is: do not retaliate, do not seek revenge, and work towards restitution. It is not enough to say you are sorry. It is not enough to be sorry. As human beings we must make amends for the hurts and harm that we cause. 

A survivor from the massacre at the concert in Paris wrote an incredibly real, raw, heart wrenching, loving, passionate piece on her Facebook wall. It is incredibly hard to read. She describes what happened in detail, yet she writes of love and kindness and our shared humanity. At 22 years old, her perspective shows that she is an old soul. I have chosen NOT to share what she wrote. It is triggering and awful and beautiful. Should you wish to read it, look up Isobel Bowdery on Facebook and scroll to the photograph of the stained white shirt. 

Beyond being horrific and shocking and painful, the attacks in Paris is a knife in the heart of the West - Not In My Back Yard. A message that we are not immune to the anger, hatred, and violence enacted by those we have othered as militant, angry, insane, terrorists. Their acts have evoked terror in the hearts and minds of the West. 

Including me. 

There will never be a time when horrific acts of atrocity make any sense to me. I will never be able to sort out the feelings inside my very soul as I react to things that I learn about what we as humans can do to other humans. It is devastating and I am fearful over what may come next. 

Be kind to yourself, be kind to others, and let your compassion touch the world. 

xoxo

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