Enquiry

April 16 was only a slightly extraordinary for me, as there was a power failure at my office when I arrived (big spring nor’easter in New England). For more than two dozen families in Virginia I’m sure it was the worst day of their lives.

In trying to gauge my reaction I find myself with an odd sense of apathy. I’ve barely read anything about it, other than noticing the initial reports. Everyone’s talking about it, making me think myself odd for not wanting to know. But I have a sense of having been down this road before: the incessant analyzing, condemning, and deploring the actions of a madman, at least until the next one comes along.

Though I know little about this particular case, it seems to me a central goal of such a crime is to make oneself the center of attention, to make oneself significant after a life of insignificance. In lieu of doing something creative that inspires other people, do something to shock and horrify. Perhaps, in one twisted sense, a killing spree is a form of creativity, insofar as it creates a very visible change from one state to another. But it is so not original.

I was shocked after Columbine, very shocked after 9/11, utterly revolted after Daniel Pearl, but seemingly after Pearl’s murder I’m no longer surprised by the extent to which human beings will brutalize one another.

After Columbine I became very interested in the lives of Eric Harris and Dylan Kleibold — I still remember their names (less sure about the spelling). I wondered what made them tick, what made them want to go out in an orgy of bloodshed. I could even relate to their feelings of alienation at school, though I could never condone their response. I was angry at them, but also, in large part, bemused.

Then came 9/11, and I was pretty damned angry about that, too, but I still wanted to understand the mindset of the hijackers, to imagine what they were doing and thinking in the hours leading up to a terrorist attack.

Then came Daniel Pearl’s murder (I was going to write, aptly, senseless murder, but it is just too cliche). Despite being revolted by the crime, I remember not caring very much at all who did it, or why.

The killers are all pretty much the same, all having some demented, half-baked rationalization for killing innocents, or not even bothering with the rationalization but just taking their anger out on the easiest targets available. Since I’m a news junkie I’m sure it won’t be long before I come across reports and analysis explaining the motivations of this particular lunatic, but for the moment I’ll relish in the bliss of ignorance, neither knowing nor caring about him.

It makes me wonder, in not caring, if I should worry I’m becoming cold just like killers are, dehumanizing them as a class, but the difference is judgment: I judge them, in observing their actions as individuals; they don’t judge, but kill anyone in a category they hate, or anyone at all.

So fuck ‘em. Fuck this killer, and fuck the next one. They’re all about the same.

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