Friday, July 08, 2005

Leaving The Cave

All I can say is those freaks with bombs picked the wrong damn city to hit if they were hoping for their intimidation to result in social or political change. Haven't they been to London and seen the giant pockmarks in the Victoria and Albert Museum? This city survived the Blitz, yo, if you think it's going to fold under some bombs, you have another thing coming.

I read almost the entire front section of the Globe and Mail today and there were many worthwhile articles, one of which pointed out something very useful to think about:

TO ANY COMPLEX PROBLEM, THERE IS A SIMPLE ANSWER THAT IS WRONG.

Because the world is a complex place. Just like democracy is a complex system. There are exceptions, there are anomolies, things change. There is nothing so administratively simple as a dictatorship

(or, as Shel Silverstein put it: "I've discovered a way to stay friends forever/There's really nothing to it/I simply tell you what to do/And you do it")

but strength is in plurality, diversity, difference and adaptation. The challenge is to manage to be wise enough to accept complexity.

3 comments:

Editorial said...

The scariest thing about the bombs going off on London transit is that city is always on high alert. They don't even have garbage cans in the Underground to prevent stuff like this from happening. And if you leave a package unattended, everyone in the store will freak out, and suddenly the cops will be on the way.

I'm a little freaked out because NYC is bad about security. The day the bombs went off in London, the MTA workers were down in the tracks trying to make sure everything was safe. Ack.

SHL said...

when I was in Barcelona one month after the Madrid bombings, I had four hours to kill until my train to left for the coast. The place was empty, there were no guards/cops to be seen, the tracks were empty and exposed and it was quite disconcerting. And where the British have previous experience with WWII and the IRA, the Spanish have ETA but you just...you're just never safe.
Sorry

robyn said...

actually, i heard that there are garbage cans in the underground, but they are specifically designed to withstand a bomb blast. perhaps not. perhaps they made like japan and took all the garbage cans out.

and no, you're not ever safe. that's the premise of living, is that bad things can happen. that's why living is so great.

but dorrie, they are doing their best to make sure you are safe. because the mta workers and their loved ones take the train too.