First they came for . . .
I read something on Facebook earlier today about the way different people are reacting to the news about terrorist attacks. The author and I are not on each others' friends-lists; I only read this entry when someone else shared it, so I don't have explicit permission to copy this (I make the conscious, reasonable assumption that I have implicit permission, since the entry was itself public). To sum it up, two drunkards were harassing a man of Middle Eastern appearance in a convenience store, and the author intervened, offering them a relatively small kindness if they would cease their harassment, which they accepted. Feel free to read the original text for clarification and further detail.
I sometimes come across narratives like this, and I sometimes imagine how I would react if I were to find myself in a similar situation, or at least how I would like to think I would react. Part of the original event was the author attempting to deflect the aggression the two men were displaying and being rebuffed on the basis of it not being his business. If I were faster on my mental feet, or with more reliable real-time access to the internet, I would like to believe I'd respond with the words attributed to Pastor Martin Niemöller.
I am disappointed that so many people on either (any?) side of a conflict regard conflict itself as a means to determine which side is in the right. Fighting doesn't make you right; it just makes it less likely that someone else will be talking about how you're wrong, whether because that someone else is dead or removed from the society or too afraid to speak out.
I sometimes come across narratives like this, and I sometimes imagine how I would react if I were to find myself in a similar situation, or at least how I would like to think I would react. Part of the original event was the author attempting to deflect the aggression the two men were displaying and being rebuffed on the basis of it not being his business. If I were faster on my mental feet, or with more reliable real-time access to the internet, I would like to believe I'd respond with the words attributed to Pastor Martin Niemöller.
I am disappointed that so many people on either (any?) side of a conflict regard conflict itself as a means to determine which side is in the right. Fighting doesn't make you right; it just makes it less likely that someone else will be talking about how you're wrong, whether because that someone else is dead or removed from the society or too afraid to speak out.