How very odd.

[baratron]

The division between the people I know in the UK and US has never been greater. Looking through my friends page today, every single post from a US-person has to do with the Space Shuttle explosion. Not a single UK-er has even mentioned it: people are talking about their weekend plans and parties. How very, very odd.

I never hear news that happens at the weekend. The Evening Standard is my main source of news (because I object to paying money to read news from the previous night), and it only publishes on weekdays. If stuff happens between Friday night and Monday morning, I don't hear about it. This Space Shuttle explosion doesn't seem very real to me, because I've only read about it on the internet (even if it was the BBC's site). It will continue to not feel real until I see it on the front pages of tomorrow's newspapers.

It's weird. I'm confused as to what the big deal is, why so many of my American friends are upset. Of course, it's tragic for anyone who knew the people involved - any death is tragic for those left behind. But all this stuff about dreams... it must only make sense to a country that has actually been involved in space exploration. I've veered between seeing it as a valuable way to find out more about our planet and a colossal waste of money. I've always seen it that way, even when I was a student in a Space and Atmospheric Physics Group.

Edit: OK, I mis-spoke. One UK-er mentioned it. A couple more in email. But even then...

Comments

[baratron.livejournal.com]

The closest UK parallel in recent times is probably the death of Princess Diana - people who had never even met her were passionate in their grief.

And that was another thing that completely boggled me. I grieved for the two, at that time quite young, children who had lost their mother. But that was as far as it went. I saw people crying a week or two weeks later, taking time off work because of their grief, and these were people who weren't even fans of Diana or the Royal Family. It didn't make any sense at all. I'd understand people being so upset if perhaps it had reminded them of a past bereavement of their own, but not for the death itself. I had people I didn't know emailing me because I had a .uk address to tell me how sorry they were for my country!

At least in this case, I can see that the Space Shuttle/space program stood for something. I might not understand what it stood for properly, or understand all the repurcussions, but I can see there is something. With Diana (who wasn't ever "Princess Diana", only ever "Diana, Princess of Wales"), I wasn't sure what was going on at all.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

I think the thing you're missing is that for a lot of people, Princess Diana (I think that's perfectly fine for colloquial usage) did stand for something. For some of them it was compassion, for others it started out being the belief that fairytales can come true and turned into more of a "girl next door against the Powers That Be" sort of story. Just about anything and anyone can be turned into a symbol if people have a need for one.