I don't mean to disappoint you but I don't really have alot to say on the Manchester attacks because I would just be repeating myself, and you would find that boring. Nonetheless, I somewhat feel compelled to write something on this bloodbath, so I will really try not to seem like I am repeating myself or recycle talking points I have used in response to past tragedies.
I feel sorrow for those whose lives were taken, those who were maimed and injured, and those who are looking for their loved ones among the missing, and sadly those feeling the pain and loss of losing a loved one. I cannot even begin to imagine what those poor people are going through right now. We musn't forget that on the recieving end of these atrocities, every time, are living and breathing human beings and wrecked families. I have nothing but complete and unconditional solidarity with the city of Manchester, and my fellow compatriots who have been affected by this tragedy.
The Burj Khalifa in Dubai in solidarity with Manchester
My emotions are surging full of rage at the evil commited by the depraved savages responsible for this heartless murder of innocents. This wasn't an attack on the powerful. It was not aimed at Presidents or Prime ministers. It wasn't even directed at armies or police forces. It was aimed at ordinary people. It targeted children, harmless, powerless, innocent children. Religious fascists don't bomb children going to an Arian Grande pop concert because they have a grievance over this or that imperialist crime on "Muslim lands". They do so because they are wicked, lawless, evil and motivated by an ideology that is based on sadism, hatred, dehumanisation, cruelty and absolutism. An ideology that not only denies, but negates any sense of morality, humanity, civilisation and virtue.
As shocking as this is, it should not be surprising. The moral universe of a Jihadist has no issues with decimating children in cold blood. For example massacaring children in a school in Peshawar, Pakistan or firing a bullet (though failed to kill) into Malala Yousufzai's head because she demanded an education. I can go on and give you inummerable examples of these kinds of atrocities in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel/Palestine, Nigeria etc. They will not hesistate to murder 'their' own children. What made you think they would not be doing the exact same thing to ours? The life of a child has no value to these nihilists.
Saffie Rose Rousse, one of the named victims.
She was 8 years old. Just 8 years old!
My heart is breaking.
A beautiful little girl decimated by bloody ugly monsters
We cannot prevent every terrorist attack. No matter how sophisticated the national security system, no matter how hard the intelligence service works, even if we turned our society into a totalitarian police state (which I would be strongly against), we still wouldn't prevent every attack. Some attacks are just going to fall through the cracks.
What we can control is our reaction. React we must, but the issue is in what type of reaction we will give. Just as Malcolm X said the racist will never be his teacher, we also must not allow theocratic fascists to be the teachers of free and civilised peoples. We must firmly state that we will not give in to the logic of terror.
We must resist that niggling temptation to sink into the politics of fear and the politics of suspicion, because once we go down that road we will end up in the desolate state of the authoritarian police state to whom we will surrender our hard won liberties to in the hope that they can gurantee us permanent security. Once we arrive at this sordid destination, then we will neither have security or liberty. All we will have is a society paralysed by fear, polarised communities, a broken social fabric and a state with a great amount of power that it will inevitably abuse and use arbitrarily.
How not to respond to terrorism 101
Unfortunately, the usual suspects have, as usual, exploited this tragedy to spread their tendentious agenda. While the people of Manchester stand united, give free taxi rides, donate blood, open their doors to strangers and make general messages of love and solidarity - the people we should really be talking about. Others call for a "final solution" and stir up racial and sectarian hatred.
This is language of fascism and effectively an incitement to genocide. She should face serious moral accountability and really ought to retract this disgusting statement. Part of our reaction must include not allowing this kind of toxic anti-Muslim demagoguery to be pervasive.
Now, we are right to be angry, to be filled with rage, even, to be filled with hate. Often in our public discourse hate is often seen as a bad thing - for good reason most of the time- and how we should focus on love - again often for good reason. But I would say that in order to know what you love, you must know what you hate (and the vice versa applies too) and there is justification in this instance for hate, at least for me, because it is directed at those who deserve it and based on a desire for justice, not directed to those who are innocent or based on revenge or a desire to persecute and demonise others.
I hate the fact that twenty two of our fellow citizens - many of them children- were murdered, I hate the savage who did it, I hate those who will apologise for it, and I hate the filthy, murderous ideology that underpins such barbarism. I want to destroy that ideology and the groups that fight under its banner. Not only destroy it, but obliterate it, extinguish it, and systematically and absolutely disgrace and discredit it. Compromise with this kind of absolutism is unthinkable and not possible. There is nothing to negotiate, I seek its complete destruction. Jihadism and its various terror surrogates must be opposed, resisted and fought wherever they are, and the resistance should only be criticised when it falters or waivers in its opposition to these reactionary forces.
What we have to realise is there is no quick solution to this problem. We cannot ignore it or explain it away with silly turgid masochistic talking points or benign but ultimately hollow statements of 'all we need is love'. Nor can we pretend that we can simply bomb, shoot, torture, legalise and "close our borders" our way out of this. What is required is a very strong and resilient political, social and ideological struggle against this form of Islamic absolutism, alongside those resisting it on the frontlines in other countries, aswell as our own (this has nothing with the 'clash of civilisations' bullshit or Eurabia alarmism), based on international solidarity above all else. But it must be rooted in a different kind of politics.
We need a politics that is unapologetic in defending what these nihilists are out to destroy; the joys of life and our 'infidel liberties'. A politics that seeks to unite people from different communities towards a common goal. A politics that neither rushes to blame the other, nor attempts to explain away evil through moral relativism or victim blaming. A politics that sees the moral outrage in terror, but also understands the need to analyse the political and social context in which terror thrives. A politics that takes religion and ideology seriously but doesn't engage in collective blame, nor calls for the persecution or authoritarian measures against the other. A politics that acknowledges that there are many stupid and immoral ways of engaging in this struggle, that are rooted in chauvanism, hatred and irrational demonology, but understands that there is no principled or intelligent way of being against this struggle. A politics that will call on all of our principles, all of our intelligence and all of our solidarity and internationalism.
In short, a very difficult politics, but a principled and intelligent one.
21 victims, not 22.
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