Paris was hit by multiple, coordinated terrorist attacks on November 13 that left 130 people dead. I do not live in France, so I don’t know how the French processed their grief. The President made a speech, there were vigils. One of the guys at Charile Hebdo made a little cartoon that went around that had very off-putting capitalization and punctuation. That’s the extent of what I know about France. Here in the States, we talked about it. Like most people, I communicate broadly on Facebook. A huge number of my friends–I should have gotten a precise sample, which I regret in hindsight–took advantage of the feature to blend a French flag into their profile picture. I rolled my eyes.
How can that possibly bring anyone solace? Why on Earth do you care? Okay, my friend with family in Paris gets a pass. But the rest of them? I like to think that as I’ve matured over the years I’m less of a dick about this kind of thing. It’s silly, sure, but it makes people happy and isn’t hurting anyone. What bothers me the most, I think, is the fact that it helps so many people. That would never be enough for me. If I suffered a tragedy, not even a terrorist attack necessarily, but something significant, that wouldn’t bring me any comfort. I suppose I could say I’m jealous that such a simple thing brings people happiness. But as I think more about it, I suppose if I’m being honest it’s more precise to say it makes me upset because it makes me realise that other people can feel secure differently than I can. The people with the flag profiles will never be able to convince me that something will be okay, that something will be enough. I suppose that sounds pompous, but it’s not that I feel as if I’m looking down on people, I just feel conspicuously more alone.
But enough about my insecurities. This is for the people who are complaining vociferously about the reaction of people in places like America are having. I’m not saying you can’t find the reactions annoying. They are. If you take offense to that, this is also for you.
Caring about 130 dying in Paris is pretty arbitrary. That arbitrariness is annoying. Heart diseases and cancers killed over 3,000 people in America every single day (http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm ). In the scheme of things, those are way, way more deadly and way, way more likely to kill you. So why does Paris get the outpouring of sentiment? Because it’s shocking. Terrorism is terrifying. “And cancer isn’t!?” Yeah, apparently not. We’re supposed to get cancer, or heart disease, or whatever. A delightful bearded man pontificates on the matter.
You’d be surprised how many times even in biology classes I’ve had the conversation that dying of age-related diseases is bad. There is a weirdly pervasive psychological apathy towards growing old and dying. It’s supposed to happen. I find it immensely terrifying, but apparently I’m in the minority. Terrorism, though, is not supposed to happen, and it’s jarringness is enough to freak plenty of people out, even though it kills way, way, way fewer people than disease.
That terror, that anxiety, we look for any way to quiet it. That is the human condition. The faithful turn to their faith. And those of us without it, or who do not find sufficient solace in it? Flags in profile pictures apparently is a viable salve for at least some of them. “Do you think the French give a shit about your new profile pics? Is that going to lessen their tragedy?” Weirdly enough, it does seem to genuinely help people. People are thankful to see that other people care. Not all people, sure. But it’s not nobody, either. People like other humans knowing they exist. Sometimes even strangers doing something simple and easy hits the spot.
Gestures like the profile pic are facile. And I mean that literally, not just as a pretentious denigration: they’re an easy thing to do. On the one hand, they do seem to make some peoples’ lives better. On the other hand, one might lobby the accusation that they provide an overvalued sense of contribution on the doer’s part. It gives a sense of accomplishment, as if you have done something to help when really you have not done that much. Any asshole can click a button to change a picture or Tweet that your “heart goes out to people impacted by the explosions”–this is one of those instances where the figurative use of “impact” ought to be avoided for double-entendre purposes. But if people know that it’s a trifling thing, and it boosts their ego commensurately, not exceptionally, then it’s probably not a big deal. But again, annoying.
So why care about Paris, but not other places? Beirut was hit by suicide bombs the previous day, Yola, Nigeria was hit 4 days later, but they did not get the same fanfare. So it is not just terrorism that causes people to care, but terrorism for people they know about. Emphasis on about. It makes sense to care about people you actually know. But strangers? Look, I’m not advocating for sociopathy, but you can’t care as much about some guy in some place you’ve never heard of as much as your own family and friends. We’re not wired for that. It’s just not possible. And that’s okay. Again though, the arbitrariness is annoying. If you can’t drum up actual affect for people you don’t know, why do the Parisians get some unnecessary attempt at it, but others don’t. Well, because we like Paris more. We can relate to the French more–or at least we think we can, which is what counts for this. http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-love-france/?ex_cid=538fb
More Americans can locate France on a map than they can Lebanon or Nigeria. And we can argue that’s bad, but as far as drummed-up sympathies go, does it really matter? Americans like France more, for any number of reasons. The reasons don’t have to be good. It’s not as if there are much in the way of objective criteria for vaguely caring about places and cultures.
I’m not opposed to wanting people to be more informed about the world at large. But the condescension gets to me, as does the hypocrisy. I saw a number of memes floating around bitching about how people only care about Paris but not about Beirut or Iraq, and although it’s not explicitly stated, the latter examples seem to be used as a synecdoche for “literally everything going on in the world.” Again, I get that arbitrariness and general ignorance can be annoying. I can totally sympathize. But a number of people sharing these memes are also people I know for a fact knew nothing about Beirut or (pick a topic) until it showed up in meme form and they got to put on airs and share it. If you’re going to condescend to people, at least put in the actual work. Sharing some Tumblr post after some subject morphs into a popular discussion piece for discourses about societal behaviors isn’t the same as sharing a news article when the event is current. More importantly, talking about how much you care about “everyone” doesn’t actually make you a good, caring, or “aware” person. If you actually care and you actually want to “raise awareness”, then do something to make people more aware. Share the news with the intent of making people more informed, not just as a springboard to tell everyone within earshot (metaphorically) about how everyone but you is so stupid, ignorant, and brainwashed. Bookmark Al Jazeera or whatever and click through some articles at lunch and share the ones you find interesting. Do it consistently. Or don’t, and admit that you don’t actually give a shit about most of the world like everybody else, and that’s okay, and move on.