All Life. Every Life. We are all born as molecules in the hearts of a billion stars. Molecules that do not understand politics or policies or differences. Over a billion years, we foolish molecules forget who we are and where we came from. In desperate acts of ego, we give ourselves names, fight over lines on maps, and pretend that our light is better than everyone else’s. The flame reminds us of the piece of those stars that lives on inside us. The spark that tells us: “You should know better.” The flame also reminds us that life is precious as each flame is unique. When it goes out, it’s gone forever. And there will never be another quite like it. So many candles will go out tonight. I wonder some days if we can see anything at all.
—Delenn on the meaning of the lit candle, “Babylon 5” – “And All My Dreams, Torn Asunder”
I had hoped to start today’s writing session with some happier news from last night but that’ll have to wait for a while as this post really can’t whilst what I’m thinking is still fresh in my mind.
When I was at university, one of my favourite ways of passing the time with friends was the various board games to be found amongst our group. Mark often offered up “Risk” and “Castle Risk” as frequent opportunities for satisfying our occasional warlike tendencies in a much more positive fashion. That positivity would often go right out the window when the Avalon-Hill game “Diplomacy” would end up on the table which was often an exercise in realpolitik, blatant lying, and backstabbing on an epic scale between the couples in our group that would be followed by recriminations and psychological warfare if not banishment from more enjoyable activities that was just plain fascinating. When viewed from a distance, that is… 😉
My usual contribution to the evening gaming sessions was a genus edition “Trivial Pursuit” and for a while it was as popular a choice amongst the larger group as the other games.
That is until it became patently clear which of us had grown up reading everything in sight, religiously watching Alex Trebek’s “Jeopardy!” and various other trivia game shows and even was the youngest captain of a high school trivia team that was featured on the public access channel which was a quick lesson in hubris when we got our theoretically well-prepared asses handed to us under the bright and very hot studio lights in downtown Jackson which is why I think Ken Jennings’ record doesn’t have to worry about me ever challenging it anytime soon.
Yeah…no one likes *THAT* kid in Trivial Pursuit. But the reason we still kept coming back to it even though everyone else would come into the game assuming how it would end was that they discovered that the nerdy introverted trivia buff had a weakness as powerful as kryptonite that decidedly leveled the playing field.
Instead of being a green coloured rock from outer space whose radiation could bring Superman or Supergirl to their knees, my kryptonite was in the form of the pink wedge for questions in the “Entertainment” category. I’d have the other five wedges in no time flat but that pink wedge tended to allow everyone else to catch up and make it a much closer fight to win with the final question where your opponents get to pick the category.
Three guesses and the first two don’t count as to which one was invariably chosen for me once I’d finally filled my token with that pink wedge!
I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m mentioning this in a post that’s largely about another mass shooting event that targeted Jews celebrating Hanukkah on Bondi Beach in Sydney, New South Wales in Australia mere hours after we’d learnt of the 389th (!!!) mass-casualty event at Brown University which saw two students killed and more injured.
Kryptonians often can’t do much to protect themselves against the effects of kryptonite but I could certainly do something about the glaring lack of knowledge in popular culture trivia by finally getting round to watching the movies and shows from which the questions were drawn.
That’s why when I’m trying to mentally process yet another bit of horrifically bad news such as these shootings or the many other atrocities humans are capable of unleashing upon each other, I often think of a quote from the shows that at least helped to make me slightly less ignorant at gaining the pink wedge in Trivial Pursuit.
It’s why I came back to the quote from Delenn of “Babylon 5” three years after the mass shooting literally just up the street in the Hedingham neighbourhood because her anguish at the loss of the unique life that is the gift of the universe as she stares at the lit candle and contemplates the flame is still the best description of how I feel every time I hear of one of these events.
And her last line perfectly sums up the despair I often feel that we as a species will ever be capable of moving beyond the violence and hatred into a more enlightened civilisation where we cherish those differences between us that make our variation on sentient life so fascinating.
Eleven people are dead and many more injured including a child fighting for their life in Bondi and they were apparently targeted because two depraved gunmen apparently couldn’t be bothered to allow them to celebrate a holiday that celebrates a miracle of the eight days of light when there was only one day’s supply of sacred oil for the lamps in the Temple after the Jews had successfully revolted against their Seleucid oppressors and could once again practise their faith.
It seems clear even at this early stage that they were targeted because they were Jewish and I’m sure the ensuing investigation will ferret out the shooter’s rationalisation why they would commit an atrocity that no deity worth following would ever consider as anything but an act hateful unto them.
I don’t really care what twisted and depraved reason they might have had for visiting terror and death amongst the Jews who only wanted to celebrate life and light that this world so desperately needs.
There is no reason why they should have been killed or injured and the extinguishing of their light that so diminishes us all any more than the suspect shooting students in Rhode Island could ever hope to justify their actions in a way that would ever make sense to anyone with even a modicum of a conscience.
So how much higher does the body count have to go before we as a planet finally decide to move past the killing and hatred and instead find more productive ways of sharing and appreciating this beautiful planet that has yet to find an equal with signs of life that we might recognise and understand in spite of the massive amounts of searching with various astronomical equipment?
How much longer do we have to wait until our world is such that those I love who are Jewish can walk down the street in their community and not have to wonder if they’ll be the target of yet another anti-Semitic atrocity?
A lot of candles went out tonight and sadly there will likely be many more before all is said and done.
What gives me hope that we might eventually get to that better future is that even though hatred and evil may well seem to be stronger if not invincible, inevitably even the most evil acts cannot stand against the way of love and peace. The way of love is much harder to walk but it is really our only hope of survival as a species.
May that day where love destroys hatred for all time come swiftly.
Until then, may the memories of those who have been unjustly taken from us too soon in an act that diminishes us all be a blessing to others.