Eerie premonition: as we runners were leaving the finish area in Vienna Sunday afternoon, we hit a bottleneck (consequence of poor design) and first thought - of stampedes at Hindu festivals - was quickly replaced by "Oh, my God, one of these days there will be a bomb at one of these events." After a minute of anguish - thinking of the capacity for damage - I settled into the question of "Why would someone pick a marathon as a target?" and answered "Well…it represents one of the more extreme cases of gratuitous Western decadence in that while much of the world starves, these 25000 runners indulge in the apex of wastefulness: using productive energy for self-glory. Yeah…I could see one of these races being a target."
Given the nature of the explosives (home-made vs ultra-sophisticated) and the date (Patriots Day/ day before income taxes) I'm leaning toward American origin (or maybe even disgruntled runner.) But the end result is indisputable: America will move yet another irreversible step into the police state it already is. Sad sad day - especially because that beautiful event won't ever have its innocence again.
A relevant frame of reference? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aEvzuA4f0c. While first clues seem to suggest a domestic origin, I post this as a way of drawing attention to the *scale* of the event and how we, as Americans, are pretty well-insulated to the consequences of damages we've inflicted on others elsewhere...and that the consequent empathy we've gained from the terrible event in our own backyard might inform/change our actions elsewhere. In advance, my apologies to anyone offended by the posting of this linkage, and please understand this doesn't diminish in any way the grief I feel for those who suffered in Boston - especially since I've crossed the finish line in more than 25 marathons.
1982. 2002. The next time I plan on running there will be in 2022. I wonder what the complexion of the Boston Marathon will be then... Background checks? Strip searches? Dogs everywhere? Bird-sized drones flitting about above the crowds and runners? No spectators allowed?
After 911 there was much discussion about the power of symbolism (via striking at symbols of American military and financial power) and that other targets of high symbolic value might include places of commerce in the heartland - e.g. Mall of America. Now it's happened at another "heartland" target. More than 500,000 runners in the US complete a marathon each year in the US in over 500 marathons. Suddenly the pre-dominant thought in the minds of these runners changes from the race to risk.
We fared badly in the war on terror - especially in terms of the jettisoning of civil liberties in the attempt "to secure a more secure future." An attack of the type at Boston Monday is virtually impossible to defend against. I wonder where the debate and responses will head.
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"White privilege is knowing that if this bomber turns out to be white, the United States government will not bomb whatever corn field or mountain town or stale suburb from which said bomber came, just to ensure that others like him or her don’t get any ideas. And if he turns out to be a member of the Irish Republican Army we won’t bomb Dublin. And if he’s an Italian-American Catholic we won’t bomb the Vatican."
