Locally, a 12-year-old toy poodle was found bludgeoned to death at the bottom of the cellar stairs belonging to an elderly couple who were not at home during a daylight break-in on Tuesday.
A veterinarian made the cause-of-death determination, according to Easthampton police.
The story was given a lead role on the front of today's newspaper.
Internationally, the recent beheading of two American freelance journalists covering conflicts in the Middle East remains a lingering horror ... even politicians are interested.
It's hardly a new observation to recall the quote attributed to the one-time Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin: "One death is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic."
The mind recoils at the notion of a very particular brutality: It is insanely cruel that the viscerally-innocent should suffer... children, animals, mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters: Taken one at a time, this is a horror.
I wonder what number turns tragedy into statistic. Is its basis sheer laziness or simple incapacity? Whatever it is, I think it is worth admitting -- weeping has its limitations and its excuses. Just because something is forgiven does not necessarily imply that it is forgiveable.
Or anyway, that's my guess.
And the knee jerk reaction is to create another statistic, a death row statistic or vengeance slaying statistic. Where's the statistics that would root out such unwell people as would do such things and get them treatment, or failing that, insulating them from society.
ReplyDeleteWe seem to be a hindsight society.