"There's something fraudulent about this eagerness to latch onto the grief of others and embrace the idea that we, too, have been victimized. This trivializes the pain felt by those who have actually lost something and pathologizes normal reactions to tragedy. Empathy is good, but feeling shocked and saddened by the shootings doesn't make us traumatized or special — these feelings make us normal."
I think she is spot on with that point.
jw
Does that also apply to the victims of 9/11, Oklahoma City, Katrina, Columbine? To me, this is meaningless psycho-babble. Until you start talking specifics, what does she really mean? Where does "empathy" end and "shock and saddened" begin?
The author has a definite political agenda. She is cloaking it in pop psychology. Her profundity is a mile-wide and an inch deep. And what makes it laughable, is that this hard core liberal probably thinks that Bill "I feel your pain" Clinton was a great President. On the other hand, when Bush is involved:
"The Virginia Tech massacre was catastrophic for the victims and their loved ones, but, unlike war, it was not catastrophic for the nation. Yet President Bush — who refuses to attend the funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq because that might "politicize" the war his administration started — ordered all federal flags at half-staff and rushed to Blacksburg to bemoan the "day of sadness for the entire nation." It's a good strategy. People busy holding candlelight vigils for the deaths in Blacksburg don't have much time left over to protest the war in Iraq.
The author is upset by Bush's attendance at the event and his cynical use of it as a diversion from the Iraq War. I believe that what happened at VaTech was a catastrophic event and "a day of sadness" for the entire nation, just as much as Oklahoma City was. This was not a run of the mill shooting at a 7/11 store. Do you think that federal flags should be at half-staff to honor the loss at Va Tech?
I believe that saying we are all Hokies is a way of indicating that we are all connected as members of this country. Our fates are inextricably tied together. I recall the words of JFK in Berlin:
"Two thousand years ago the proudest boast was "civis Romanus sum." Today, in the world of freedom, the proudest boast is "Ich bin ein Berliner."
..."You live in a defended island of freedom, but your life is part of the main. so let me ask you, as I close, to lift your eyes beyond the dangers of today, to the hope of tomorrow, beyond the freedom merely of this city of Berlin, or your country of Germany, to the advance of freedom everywhere, beyond the wall to the day of peace with justice, beyond yourselves and ourselves to all mankind."
Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free. When all are free, then we can look forward to that day when this city will be joined as one and this country and this great Continent of Europe in a peaceful and hopeful globe. When that day finally comes, as it will, the people of west Berlin can take sober satisfaction in the fact that they were in the front lines for almost two decades.
All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words "Ich bin ein Berliner."