This is one Hell of a way to wake up: seeing this on the news. So Bin Laden is dead. I cannot say much about it beyond the cliché I am afraid. I thought to title this post "Satan is dead", but that would have been ridiculously pompous. He was no Satan, nobody is, nobody ever was in history. I don't believe in Satan. Bin Laden was just an evil man, a terribly evil man, who got what has been coming at him. It was about time.
I blogged about 9/11 time and again... And again. I wish Bin Laden had been judged for his crimes, but there is justice in his death, especially as it is the result of a military operation. I was afraid he might die of old age. This would have been the greatest, most appalling form of injustice, and of the Western's impotence against Islamofascist threat. I cannot help but feel smug that Barack Obama succeeded hwere the buffoons of the religious right miserably failed, for about nearly ten years. Of course, Bin Laden was only one head of the hydra that is Islamist terrorism. But I think of my American friends, among them a New Yorker, and I feel like celebrating with them.
J'étais en train de suivre les nouvelles à la télé et sur internet après Tout le monde en parle lorsque j'ai vu l'annonce d'une adresse à la nation un dimanche soir à 22h30. Pour choisir un temps aussi impromptu, il fallait que ce soit une très grosse nouvelle. En attendant cette annonce mainte fois reportée, la rumeur a été rapidement confirmée, il ne manquait que les détails et la confirmation du président. C'était quelque chose de voir ça en direct, suivi des manifestations de joie un peu surréalistes (c'est quand même pour la mort de quelqu'un) devant la maison blanche et ailleurs, d'énormes masses d'étudiants subitement extrêment patriotiques. Le 1er mai 2011 ne sera pas oublié de sitôt.
ReplyDeleteAnother person's death isn't usually cause for celebration. But in this man's case it most certainly is a relief to read about it. And yet there will still be people with hearts filled with hatred towards others whose religious, tribal, and political philosophies differ to theirs. So what really did his death achieve other than to fuel this hatred even more...nothing much changes. As cliched as it is, an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind :-(
ReplyDelete@PJ-Je l'ai appris ce matin, n'ayant hélas pas pu le voir en direct.
ReplyDelete@Anonymous-There is fatally an element of vengeance in it, but unfortunately in that case it was necessary. His death achieved some kind of closure to the victims of 9/11, it also made him pay for his crimes, to a degree at least.
I wouldn't normally take any delight in someone's death, but Bin Laden became almost an abstract bogeyman to the world at large. Knowing he was out there, possibly plotting more death and destruction, just made him seem far more powerful than he really was. His death takes away this mythical enhancement of his image, and reminds the old that this bogeyman was just a rotten human being in the end.
ReplyDelete@The Gill-Man-Very true. He was certainly a bogeyman and the Emmanuel Goldstein to the religious right. But unlike Goldstein, he was mortal.
ReplyDelete