Unity

There is an ancient human reaction to publicly shared trauma. There are cries for 'unity' and 'solidarity' in the face of some faceless enemy. This reaction is ancient, perhaps hard-wired in a neurological sense, but it is not very conscientious or rational. It does not advance peace. It does not advance humanity.

 

This is the reflex which causes people to unite against any common enemy. It is the reflex which kept segregation and racial oppression going in the American South for a century after slavery was abolished. It is the reflex which persecuted decent people during the McCarthy purges of the 1950s. It is the reflex which supported our invasion of Vietnam to prop up a corrupt regime. It is the reflex which led to the futile wars in Iraq and Afghanistan after September 11th, 2001.

 

Two radio spots this morning brought all this to the front of my mind. One spot was a recording of blood-lusting pro-hockey fans singing a nationalist anthem at Boston's hockey arena as some sort of expression of bewildered emotion in the wake of a senseless bombing on April 15th. The second was an interview with a Black Boston minister who has exploited ghetto violence to make a media career. This gentleman has never wasted any opportunity to turn any tragedy into a media-op for himself.

 

Both radio spots were presented as examples of Boston's great coping ability in the wake of violence. I found this quite annoying. Falling back on sentimental nationalism by people who love violence led to Fascism in Europe in the 1930s. Preaching about 'god's plan' in the wake of senseless violence by someone who is part of the violence problem in his own isolationist community is an insult to an intelligent mind.

 

Our national and local politicians feed on this knee-jerk human reaction to bolster their images and to gain publicity. Rather than produce a sense of intelligent realism that there are many bad people in a country which affords many opportunities to kill people with guns and explosives, they foster the delusion that this event was somehow an anomaly. This is a way to diminish the possibility of a different kind of unity of purpose in the public.

 

The unity of purpose which should come out of the Marathon bombing should meld with the unity of purpose which is being demonstrated by the people of Newtown, Connecticut, after the atrocity at their elementary school. The unity of purpose should meld with the work of survivors of the Columbine massacre. The unity of purpose should face down the paranoid lunatics of the National Rifle Association and others who cling to their ability to own mass-murder weaponry.