Christchurch, New Zealand

/ Sirius Bizinus

Image taken from Wikimedia Commons.

I didn’t expect to see this kind of news today. The link is to an ABC news report on a mass shooting in New Zealand. Details are still coming out. Right now, estimates are that more than 40 people have been killed. Here is one perspective from someone from Aotearoa New Zealand

The people of New Zealand have my deepest sympathies.
I wish there was some way to meaningfully express them. Mass shootings are always tragedies. New Zealand isn’t a country known for violence of any sort. Where I live, I’ve developed a numb shell whenever I hear about them. I can only imagine the shock this must be to New Zealanders. No nation deserves to suffer through something like this.

If the allegations on the news are all true, this act was perpetrated by an Australian protesting immigration (no word on whose immigration). My heart breaks for the people in those mosques who were just trying to get through another day in their lives. Their worlds have been altered and scarred by someone who weaponized ignorance instead of flourishing in understanding.

In the end, the “why” of such tragedies is insignificant compared to the question of what comes next. There’s going to be a lot of discussion about how to react to such a loss of life. I have the utmost confidence that the people of New Zealand will handle it with their characteristic sensibility. Sensibility is the best virtue to have in the face of such adversity.

6 thoughts on “Christchurch, New Zealand”

  5. As a New Zealander I was shocked and very sad from the senseless violence that has happened. Our country likes to pride itself on being a safe and friendly place where people from all cultures are welcomed. As a small, isolated country, the idea that a terrorist attack on this scale would happen here seemed unfathomable to most; but now that has all changed. Out of all the bad, I am glad that the police managed to quickly arrest the assailants before more damage was done, and that there has been big support for the surviving victims of this massacre.

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  6. I think it is high time we finally recognize the FACT, that the western ultra neo-conservative extremists today motivated to violence by right wing populist rethorics are infact the same as the ultra neo-conservative Islamist extremists today motivated to violence by similar right wing populist rethorics. In reality they share most of the same values. In general they all think that violence is an answer. That a conflict between the Western and Middle-Eastern worlds is a good thing and they are working to achieve escalation of it. That traditional values should be respected by the virtue of them being traditional. That those traditional values are what they get to say they are. That women are not equal to men. That homosexuals are an abomination. That majorities have a right to oppress minorities. That might makes right. In other words they share fascist values.

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