And then the worst happens…
I hear the news from the cashier in the supermarket. Utrecht. Three dead. Five injured. I pay and bike home. On the way, I pass a tram. People are on their phones. A few stare out the window. A shiver runs down my back. At home, I need to send an email to a client. I consider saying something about Utrecht. It feels strange not to mention it. It also feels strange to do so. Is it disrespectful if life just goes on?
I still remember seeing the two planes drilling into the Twin Towers and thinking: this is going horribly wrong. The world suddenly seemed like a very unsafe place where at any moment a madman could set off a bomb or start shooting at you. Because I also have Australian nationality (don't tell Geert Wilders), I considered moving with my family to a remote place on the west coast, far away from all the dangerous lunatics with their extremist ideas and hatred for anyone who thinks a little differently than they do. The only thing we would have to fear there were derailed kangaroos and the occasional shark.
After 9/11, I expected a wave of attacks. I envisioned a world where soldiers would be standing on every street corner, where you would be searched at every opportunity, I thought that new disasters would happen every day. I saw a future world full of fear and violence. The first few weeks after 9/11, no one could talk about anything else. We were alert. We thought the world would never be the same again. And then the strange happened: we returned to the order of the day.
After a number of relatively quiet years – at least in the west, in the Middle East they will think differently about that – during which the only major change is that you can no longer take liquids on the plane, violence has increased enormously in recent years, especially in places where you least expect it. A Christmas market. A death metal concert. Just last Friday in the sleepiest town in the world. And now on the tram in Utrecht.
The randomness and unpredictability make it even more frightening. You might be able to avoid stations, airports, churches, and mosques, but what if you get shot off your bike tomorrow while on your way to work? What if terrorists invade your school or the handball club? Should we just stay indoors for the rest of our lives?
What I want to convey with this story is that we are defenseless. You simply cannot protect yourself against people who are crazy and want to do harm. Not even if you move to that coastal town in Western Australia. The only thing we can do is return to the order of the day. Continue praying. Continue sitting on the tram. Continue headbanging. Continue shopping. Continue going to school.
That is not because the victims and their loved ones do not matter, but because we must never let fear win. We must go on. And if we are going to change our behavior because of the attacks, then for heaven's sake, let’s be a little kinder to each other.
(note: at the time of writing this piece, the motive of the perpetrator is still unknown)
