The Oslo/Utøya massacre - again

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Norway has been hit with the worst violence since 1945. A deluded person set off a bomb outside our Government before driving to a Labor Party youth summer camp where he slaughtered innocent children and young people.

In the chaos that followed the bombing, there were several suggestions that this was caused by imported terrorists with links to al-Qaeda or the infamous mullah Krekar, who is living in Oslo since we cannot return him to his own country where he risks the death penalty.

It turned out to be a genuine homegrown terrorist, blond and Nordic in appearance, intelligent and well-spoken. He struck at the heart of our political system by murdering young people at a place which is the heart of the Norwegian Labor party, the Utøya summer camp. My oldest son probably has friends who were there or were planning to go, but we don’t know yet. The names of the victims haven’t been released.

It took me two days to realize the monstrosity. I’ve been in a haze for two days, glued to the TV and the Internet, trying to keep track of events, trying to realize what was happening. Now I’m writing with tears in my eyes. What can make an apparently intelligent person living in one of the most peaceful corners of the world perform such atrocities? I’m trying to understand the evil, I’m watching his YouTube video, I’m reading his “manifesto”. It speaks of a “logic” previously wielded by European terrorist groups like RAF, and contains passages originally written by Ted Kaczynski. It was terrorism, political terrorism not perpetrated by al-Qaeda or “muslims” but by a conservative, intelligent, white, blond madman.

The fundamental problem we face is hate. Hate and fear brought this. The killer wanted to advance his own sick political agenda by spreading fear, by spreading hate. Don’t let the hate take over; if we hate then the terrorists wil have won. Yes, we’re angry, we’re stricken with grief and anger, but we cannot let the anger fester and turn to hate. As one of the youngsters who survived Utøya said: “If one man can show so much hate, think how much love we all can show together”.

At the memorial service in Oslo today, they played the music written to one of the finest poems by a Norwegian poet, Nordahl Grieg who was shot down in an airplane over Berlin in 1943.

To the young

*Faced by your enemies
On every hand
Battle is menacing,
Now make your stand

Fearful your question,
Defenceless, open
What shall I fight with?
What is my weapon?

Here is your battle plan,
Here is your shield
Faith in this life of ours,
The common weal

For all our children’s sake,
Save it, defend it,
Pay any price you must,
They shall not end it

Neat stacks of cannon shells,
Row upon row
Death to the life you love,
All that you know

War is contempt for life,
Peace is creation
Death’s march is halted
By determination

We all deserve the world,
Harvest and seed
Hunger and poverty
Are born of greed

Don’t turn your face away
From needs of others
Reach out a helping hand
To all your brothers

Here is our solemn vow,
From land to land
We will protect our world
From tyrants’ hand

Defend the beautiful,
Gentle and innocent
Like any mother would
Care for her infant*

Nordahl Grieg, 1936, English translation by Rod Sinclair (2004)

2

Thank you for your perspective as a Norwegian and a citizen of the world. Hate indeed. This madman concluded he was at war - with forces that he felt justified the slaughter of innocents. No words can help me make sense of that.

3

In the other thread someone asked why someone, or a group of someones on the island didn’t stop Anders Breivik on Utoya island. What bullshit. I remember this Norwegian friend I had in college. I was undergrad and he was a grad student, but we met through the same martial arts class. The guy was build like a shit brickhouse, former military and I have no doubt he could have “done something.” I bet there are thousands and thousands of Norwegian men wishing they had been there and could have done something. So what? They weren’t there, and it’s unbelievably insulting to ask why not.

You know what we’re fighting here? Conservative religious paranoid xenophobic redneck gun-nuts who would just love to spread their paranoid fears and delusions over the whole world, and turn the whole world into Mogadishu, or Bogota, or Grozny. It would be so wonderful for them. Everyone could be armed! They could kill people they don’t like! The more weapons and fear you spread around, the more hateful murderous fun you get to have!

Norway is not that place. I hope with all my heart it is never that place. I hope they never “learn their lesson” or change in any fundamental way. I hope they stay the same intelligent, advanced peace-loving people tomorrow, as they were last Thursday. I hope they stay that way forever.

I am so sick of hate and fear and violence mongering conservative Christians, and Muslims, and Jews, and all the other pathetic, childish, fearful, hateful gun-loving redneck violence prone animals who continually attempt to make the rest of us live in their world.

You can’t have it. You can’t have Norway. Not now, not ever.

4

My wife and I were talking about this yesterday and she drew the same parallel between Breivik and the Islamic Fundamentalists – fearful reactionaries, afraid of the changes of the modern world, willing to murder to keep their intolerance safe from the forces of openness and multiculturism.

5

There will always be evil in the world. There will always be someone willing to do this kind of thing–sometimes they’ll use an ideology to justify themselves, and sometimes they’ll want power, and sometimes they’ll just want to kill people. Even in the most civilized, peaceful parts of the world. Human beings are like that.

Human beings are also brave and compassionate and good. We can stand together and refuse to let evil take over. But it will always be there.

6

No.

This is such unbelievable bullshit; I’m really sickened by your attempt to spin the incident this way. It has nothing to do with “Everyone could be armed” or “rednecks” or “gun-nuts” or “spreading weapons around.”

And, just so it’s out there: individual mass-bombers and terrorist groups get all the publicity, but far more people are still killed by governments, whether it’s outright genocide initiated by the government or policies that lead to starvation.

7

I think it would be nice to have an MPSIMS thread where people can express their grief.

If people would like to debate the underlying issues, gun control, politics, religion, or anything else, please start a new thread in GD.

This thread is not the appropriate place for it.

Thanks,

twickster, MPSIMS moderator

8

Thank you, twickster!

The largest Norwegian newspaper, VG, has put up a page for everybody to show their sympathy: http://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/oslobomben/lenke.php

9

I am so sorry this happened.

I keep seeing parallels to the Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombings back in 1995, from the “white power” angle to the use of fertilizer in a bomb to the targeting of government buildings/agencies to the murder of children to an initial blame on Mid-East/Muslim terrorists and the revelation it was a home-grown white man at fault. There are some differences as well, of course, but I think it’s not just hate but fear as well at work here.

I don’t understand, either. I mean, I can see some sort of logic at work, but emotionally I just don’t “get” it. I don’t understand loathing people sufficiently to want to kill them, it’s not something I’ve felt.

10

The first thing I said to a co-worker was, “How can anyone hate Norway?” Now I know–a Norwegian.

11

This line is what broke my calm and brought me to tears. I can’t fathom surviving such horror and having that much forgiveness in my heart. This young person is a much better person than I, or I would bet most of us, could be in the situation.

I will carry this young person’s courage with me today, as I keep you, your family, and your country in my thoughts.

12

I was pretty shaken by this. I’m a young (at least until recently), politically active person involved in a left-wing party – exactly like the children, teenagers, and young adults he massacred on Utoeya. How many events just like that have I been to? Retreats, conventions, and so forth? That’s where I was just this June in Vancouver.

Some of the most committed and idealistic young people in that country have been murdered for their political beliefs. Norway is one-seventh of Canada’s population – I imagine the effect of six hundred of the brilliant and passionate young people I’ve worked with in my party (some of whom are now members of Parliament) slain in one day and it gives me the cold shakes.

I have plenty to say about this on the political analysis front, but I don’t think I want to right now. For the present, I only pray that Norway won’t be horribly transformed by this atrocity, and that the loved ones and colleagues of the young people who perished will eventually find some peace and comfort.

13

+1

You can also send an e-mail to the Norwegian Embassy/Consulate in your country, expressing your condolences.

14

Also, has there previously been a case in which a comparable number of people have been murdered at once for their membership in a political party, in a democratic country?