Things got shaky in Europe pretty quickly. I write this post two weeks ahead of publishing, so everything could have happened between now and when you’re reading this.
Everybody seems to have gone mad. We’ve had an almost daily succession of violent events during the past week. It is all blamed on IS terrorists and the IS itself (if there is such a single entity indeed) claims responsibility. In reality it does not seem so clear though.
One guy born in Iran and having run amok in Munich seems to have been more of a Nazi, racist and convinced of his Aryan superiority, full of hate for his victims who all were immigrants of Bosnian, Arab and Turkish origin. If you think of it, this guy definitely didn’t sympathize with the IS. He still began his rampage in the same week as some other guys likely related to IS, or at least saying so in their final vanity.
It all does not make sense. The only common thread seems to be a desire for violence, coupled to a disregard for their own lives. It’s depressing. Meanwhile we wait for the next thing to happen, and at the same time the populists try to take advantage of the situation, try to hurl us down into a maelstrom of violence and counter-violence.
Yesterday a priest was cruelly killed in France. The two terrorists, shot by the police when they left the church, were said to have been “neutralized”.
The discussion forums of the newspapers were full of comments. The last I saw were 6000 comments below one single article.
Wise words? Few. One comment suggested family, friends and indeed the whole circle of acquaintances of all terrorists should be “neutralized”. I asked if he really meant mass killings, and he said, no, he had only meant those people should be detained.
Well, asking for plain murder still seems to be off-limits, but obviously concentration camps become thinkable again. And I’m afraid that’s exactly where we’re heading.