MAS crashed near Ukrain believed shot at.
And the rest, shall we say, has come as a black history for the nation, following the yet unknown fate of flight MH370.
There are a few things that I've come to realize or observe out of the whole incident, and I'll try to keep them short and concise:
1) Victim blaming
Not long after the news come out, some are quick to point out 'why did Malaysia airline choose to fly over the area, knowing a war is breaking out?'. This sentiment is not only echoed by some Malaysian (ever to fall into the whole victim blaming mentality) but extend to some foreign journalists too.
At least we now know they're as crappy as our counterpart here.
'Alternative routes don't kill people, missiles do'.
2) Social media mindless sharing
Regarding 1), social media makes the spreading of these baseless and nonsensical opinion like wildfire. Remember, there is such thing as 'bad opinions', and these should be curbed.
I have issues with those who are out to share images of the deceased too (no matter what the incident are). Necrophiliac much?
3) Diversion of attention
I notice this going on among the more loudmouthed Malaysians, who go on to say 'at the same time, the world turn away from the violence in Gaza'.
Actually, I think they are the ones who are selectively choosing which one they would rather sympathize. That is a very selfish statement man; c'mon, isn't it time we look pass our own selected race or religion and look at ourself as part of the human race?
4) We can't afford to ignore terrorism
The news bring me back to 2001, when I had come across the news of September 11 back when I was pretty young and naive. I can't say that it greatly affected me then, but it is events like these which make you realize that all those talk of 'terrorism' and 'war'... well, they could be much closer to you than you'd like to think.
I wonder how the younger generation feel, when the world is getting much stranger, what's with the recent case of missing aircraft and now, a shot down plane. Would this event change the way they view the world? Maybe, or maybe not - the amount of bullshit people spew out thanks to social media is enough to make people grow apathetic over this kind of thing.
And speaking of terrorism...
5) Terrorism aim for terror, not destruction
A side thought hit me on the topic of terrorism: on how the intention is not really to kill people en masse (we have war for that), but really to bring terror.
So with this incident (coupled with the missing MH370), if people are going to ask me, 'would you be afraid of riding the plane in light of this event?', I would probably say, 'a bit, but hey, there are a lot of other worse things which are statistically more probable'.
That last sentence makes me wanna punch myself, too for sounding like a smartass, yeah, but you get the gist of it.
6) Not everyone can give a damn (or we just give them in a different way)
Or rather, some of us have different coping mechanism. Think of it this way: when you feel bitter at how some appear to lack reaction to the news, what is it that trigger you? Is it a sense of being 'right'? Or rather, is it your ego speaking?
And oh, mark my words that whatever you do, everyone is out to judge you:
Say something wrong, and people will call you out.
Say nothing, and people will accuse you of being apathetic.
Say something 'right', and some would accuse you of jumping the bandwagon.
But we have to come to term, that in the grand scheme of thing, for a single person point of view, there are just many things for one to truly care about - one's man news is another man's fish wrapper, you know. Different people have different priority, lets learn to understand that.
7) It's about us
I can't help but shake the feeling that whenever these things happen, a lot of people jump up on the keyboard - ones who play the part of the blamer, the sympathizer, the judge - because they want to feel like they did something about it.
Maybe I'm sounding cynical here, but to most of us, we're out there just to make ourself feel good. It's not really about them, it's about us.
Does this post come as a sort of irony? Maybe.
8) Shit happens. Life goes on.
At the end of the day, we have to remember it all comes to that. People have died, fingers are being pointed, talks are ongoing, sadness and despair creeps, people demand responsibility... and what happens next for the rest of us? For the majority of us who are safe in our own bubbles of comfort, how far can we go through the whole chain of events?
For sure this is all an attack on humanity, how everything is connected, and there are calls for a resolution. But let us stop all the wise-talking, victim blaming, emotional laden attack, selfish acts, and extend our thoughts to the victims of MH17: on the mortality of the human life, how all could end in one idiotic snap of the finger.
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