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Beyond our Borders

Compassion for the slain must reach beyond citizenship

Jim Bowman, Guest Columnist

Issue date: 4/26/07 Section: Opinion
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In the aftermath of a series of car bombs that killed nearly 300 people in Iraq between April 15 and 19: (Clockwise from top left) An unidentified man, left, carries the coffin of his bride-to-be, who was killed in a car bombing in Karbala on their wedding day. Karar Khaudier and his aunt mourn his father, a victim of a car bomb that killed 183 in Baghdad the previous day. An Iraqi boy rides past the wreck of a car bomb that killed 18 people in Baghdad. (AP)
In the aftermath of a series of car bombs that killed nearly 300 people in Iraq between April 15 and 19: (Clockwise from top left) An unidentified man, left, carries the coffin of his bride-to-be, who was killed in a car bombing in Karbala on their wedding day. Karar Khaudier and his aunt mourn his father, a victim of a car bomb that killed 183 in Baghdad the previous day. An Iraqi boy rides past the wreck of a car bomb that killed 18 people in Baghdad. (AP)



Students read a banner at Baghdad Technology University, Iraq, expressing condolences for the shooting victims of Virginia Tech. The banner reads:
Students read a banner at Baghdad Technology University, Iraq, expressing condolences for the shooting victims of Virginia Tech. The banner reads: "The Council of Students Union in University of Technology, and the students, condemn the recent criminal act in the Technological Sciences University in Virginia, which murdered a number of students. This is an act we reject as it is a violation of the sanctity of universities throughout the world as a whole. We convey our warmest condolences to the families of the victims who are suffering the same as those of Iraqi universities now." (AP)


I want to thank PSU for memorializing the fallen victims of the recent Virginia Tech massacre. I think it's important for people to commemorate those innocents who have lost lives in such tragic events.

Something does trouble me, though. Only one day later, four coordinated car bombs exploded in Baghdad, Iraq, killing over 250 people. I've yet to see a cable or network news channel profile any of the fallen in that event. I've yet to see a candlelight vigil. That headline story actually faded away almost hours after being posted by the Associated Press. Being proud of your country is one thing, but it feels exceedingly ethnocentric to cover an occurrence like the Virginia Tech shooting spree 24/7 on the news, while not paying due respect to those lives lost in a similar terrorist event halfway across the globe, in a place that is supposed to be under the control of our troops. Five times the number of innocent lives were snuffed out in that mass slaying.

This is not meant to diminish the memorial of those victims at Virginia Tech in any way. My heart, like yours, goes out to the families of the fallen, the students and staff of the institute, and everyone else who was touched by that horrible day.

But I don't believe our caring souls are meant to stop at national borders. Before we are Americans, we are human beings. I challenge readers to investigate what's been going on in Darfur, or in Iraq, or in any number of places around the globe, and to extend the same kind of prayer and compassion for those people who lose their lives every day in equally horrible circumstances, even while we heal and move on after our own moment of horror in Virginia.




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