It Can’t Happen Here
Coverage of Fort Hood’s horrific tragedy has been supplanted, as such events usually are, by exhaustive analysis of what brought the gunman to where he is today. Some pundits point to an apparent lack of support for military stress disorders and cite this event as the latest evidence of a military that is ready to go home. Others have leapt on Nidal Hasan’s religion, using it as a pretext for prejudice, suggesting that an enemy faith is out to undermine the American way.
As I read the seemingly endless speculation, my own mind went to one of my favorite songs: Okkervil River’s “The War Criminal Rises and Speaks,” which deals with the remoteness – or lack thereof – of such actions to our own identities. Have a listen:
Okkervil River – The War Criminal Rises and Speaks
(Complete lyrics can be found here.)
I don’t think that Major Nidal is deserving of sympathy – not by any stretch of the imagination. His actions, to state the obvious, were sickening, evil and certainly uncalled for. And I certainly have no idea if he plans to atone, as the war criminal in the song does. But when confronted with such horrors, the very human tendency is to build a sort of wall – to quarantine ourselves, as it were, by assuring ourselves that it was an aberration, unlikely to happen again. After describing the trial of that criminal, a man who sounds very much like Oran Henderson, Will Sheff sings sardonically, “Your heart’s warm and kind./Your mind is your own./Our blood-spattered criminal is inscrutable; don’t worry, he won’t rise up behind your eyes and take wild control./He’s not of this time, he fell out of a hole.”
In order to prevent such atrocities, it is helpful to remember that Major Hasan did not fall out of a hole. And as hard as it may be to look within ourselves and consider the circumstances that would drive one to such unthinkable measures, insisting that he is no human relation to us will not allow us to stop such events from happening again.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Would you like to join in the discussion?Comments
Have something to add?