In the aftermath of the Boston tragedy, hearts went out to the Richard family. The explosion which tore through the area where the Richard family were cheering on their runner friends, killed eight-year old Martin Richard, caused brain injuries to his mother, while his six-year-old sister is reported to have lost her leg.
There is no reason why the death of innocent victims should not be equally shocking regardless of where they come from
The explosion claimed another two fatalities and injured 176 people, but it was Martin – the boy with the huge eyes who had held out a poster with the words “No more hurting people – Peace” – who came to symbolise the tragedy. You couldn’t not be moved by the dreadful irony of it all.
As the expressions of grief poured in, so did the controversies. Why were we so devastated because of the loss of life in Boston, but not as visibly grief-stricken by the higher daily death toll in war-torn and drought-ridden countries? Were we more impressed by the deaths of people in the Western world?
Why was the media going overboard about these deaths while dedicating relatively little attention to the death of boat people who died when crossing the Mediterranean? On they went, basically insinuating that we value the lives of people in the Western world more than we value other lives.
This kind of reasoning is based on the fallacy that the people who mourn for the Boston victims aren’t as concerned about the plight of victims in the non-Western world. In fact, there is no reason why the death of innocent victims should not be equally shocking regardless of where they come from. However, when tragedy strikes closer to ‘home’ in a country which is not at war, it is natural that we feel a greater emotional connection to the tragedy.
The fact that we could put a face to the victims of the Boston tragedy means we could identify and sympathise with them, and not view them as sad statistics, which is unfortunately the case with victims in more remote, less media accessible world.
This is the reason for the recent outpouring of grief after Boston – a natural consequence of emotional identification that has pierced the veil of compassion fatigue.
• Prime Minister Joseph Muscat went back to school last week. On a visit to St Aloysius’ College the Prime Minister elicited smiles from the students when he told them about his brush with the disciplinary arm of the Jesuits. Many years ago, when the idea of becoming Prime Minister wasn’t yet a twinkle in Muscat’s eye, and when he shared a classroom with Franco Debono and other future MPs such as Edward Zammit Lewis, Muscat fell foul of the compulsory-vest-wearing rule.
He was given his bus fare and told to go home to put on a vest and to go back for an after-school detention for contravening the rule in the first place. Not wanting to rattle all the way down to his home in Burmarrad, Muscat engaged in a bit of lateral thinking and borrowed a vest from a friend who lived close by. His quick-thinking earned him a reprieve, and an amusing anecdote to retell on occasions like this.
The subsequent online chatter about the visit skated over the issues of what George Pullicino would have done had he found himself in a similar predicament, and the wisdom (if any) of wearing a vest in the scorching days of May and June. And then a couple of people started coming across all shocked about how irresponsible and downright cruel it was to send a child back home for the relatively trivial offence of not wearing an undervest.
Come to think of it, if something like that had to happen today and a student was sent back home for not turning up in full uniform, all hell would be unleashed upon whoever had the temerity to suggest such a measure. The full wrath of indignant parents would fall upon the school administrators, who could also expect visits (or worse) from the educational authorities and child-protection agencies.
While the disciplinary measures visited upon the young Prime Minister may have been a bit draconian, we’ve now swung to the other side of the spectrum with children being cosseted and mollycoddled. These days it would be practically unthinkable to scold or detain a student for not respecting school rules, let alone send him home unaccompanied to retrieve the missing item of clothing. It would be deemed to be an unnecessary harsh punishment to deprive a student of a couple of hours of lessons, and also rather risky to let him roam outside unaccompanied.
I’m not sure that the over-protective approach is proving to be very successful. With parental paranoia holding sway and their offspring leading a bubble-wrapped existence, children are becoming increasingly removed from any form of reprimand and the ability to recognise the consequences of their misdeeds or carelessness.
The short-term effects of such an approach may not be very evident, but I wonder what will happen when the bubble wrap falls off, the helicopter parents buzz away and real life starts.
cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt