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I tolerate this century, but I don't enjoy it.
All of the ephemera that is far too trivial to be bothered with elsewhere on this site or, depending on your point of view, a meta-commentary on it. This ephemera includes, but is not limited to art, music and literature. Most of the content here will be discussed in terms that are as abstract as possible, reality being a singularly overrated concept.
Thursday, July 07, 2005
London has certainly been subject to violence and destruction throughout its history, from the blitz to the IRA bombings (think of Conrad's The Secret Agent), in a way that New York had not when it was attacked. The city is far from being a stranger to violence and destruction. But of course, the IRA bombings in London were significantly more targeted, with warnings issued beforehand. Today's attacks remind me of something quite different; the nail bomb attacks of David Copeland from a few years ago. In both cases, the attacks balanced precise planning with an indiscriminate approach to slaughter, motivated by a utopian (never a positive term in my lexicon) dislike for the unlike (whether unbelievers or immigrants). There were no warnings, no concrete or feasible demands, merely the projection of raw force. Such things have less in common with guerilla warfare as a military technique than with sociopathy.
The worst aspect is that the extent of shock at what has happened seems diminished, in spite of its greater proximity, in comparison to what happened in New York. Partly, this is a question of scale, the horrible sense that individual tragedies must qualify as statistics before it can become a calamity, but equally the attacks here were not entirely unexpected (indeed, inevitable was the word that had been used) and there is a certain sense of fatalism, a certain horrible normalisation of destruction. At present, the bombings seem like a natural disaster that one can only respond to with the weared resignation that it has become necessary to reaccustom onself to destruction as an unavoidable part of life.
Update: Some interesting perspectives from Ian McEwan:"The mood on the streets was of numb acceptance, or strange calm. People obediently shuffled this way and that, directed round road blocks by a whole new citizens' army of "support" officials - like air raid wardens from the last war... In Auden's famous poem, Musee des Beaux Arts, the tragedy of Icarus falling from the sky is accompanied by life simply refusing to be disrupted. A ploughman goes about his work, a ship "sailed calmly on", dogs keep on with "their doggy business". In London yesterday, where crowds fumbling with mobile phones tried to find unimpeded ways across the city, there was much evidence of the truth of Auden's insight. "
posted by Richard 6:21 pm
