Dear worried Americans (and Canadians)
Jul. 7th, 2005 04:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
baratronI can't pretend to speak for all Londoners, but for the ones I do speak for...
I imagine it's worse for you because of 9/11 flashbacks, but we're ok. Seriously. London has been dealing with bombs since the Blitz in WWII. We had the IRA blowing up parts of London and SE England for 25 years, forgodsake. Even despite their ceasefire, we still have reinforced post boxes and litter bins on the streets, and no litter bins on public transport. (This was the thing that amazed me most about recent travels in the US - the authorities claiming they were afraid of attack, yet there were bins everywhere - even in the airports!)
I grew up halfway between Sandhurst Military Academy (where Prince Harry is going) and Aldershot, the home of the British Army. We had a bomb scare every other week, and about 1/4 of them turned out to be real bombs. Evacuating Marks & Spencer to go and sit in McDonalds for half an hour until we got the all-clear was just what we did. You just pay attention to any unattended bags or packages, and get on with it.
I remember the Selfridges bomb, the bomb on the rail line between Brookwood and Woking, the Canary Wharf bomb, the bus that blew up along the Strand... all ones that people I know were caught up in. Only a few years ago, a lone nut decided to nailbomb parts of London associated with ethnic minorities and queers - the bomb blowing up the Admiral Duncan pub in Soho affected me deeply, not least of all because Richard's work is just round the corner from it and one of his co-workers only narrowly escaped injury. But we survived. The pub is still standing, and features a memorial to the people who died - and I urge anyone interested in queer history to go there and see.
We've had terrorists, nuts and loons for longer than I've even been alive. This is just another one of those things. It's tragic for the families of the people killed, but they can't get us all. They didn't manage it in WWII. They won't manage it now.
P.S. I don't often agree with him, but Go Ken!
I imagine it's worse for you because of 9/11 flashbacks, but we're ok. Seriously. London has been dealing with bombs since the Blitz in WWII. We had the IRA blowing up parts of London and SE England for 25 years, forgodsake. Even despite their ceasefire, we still have reinforced post boxes and litter bins on the streets, and no litter bins on public transport. (This was the thing that amazed me most about recent travels in the US - the authorities claiming they were afraid of attack, yet there were bins everywhere - even in the airports!)
I grew up halfway between Sandhurst Military Academy (where Prince Harry is going) and Aldershot, the home of the British Army. We had a bomb scare every other week, and about 1/4 of them turned out to be real bombs. Evacuating Marks & Spencer to go and sit in McDonalds for half an hour until we got the all-clear was just what we did. You just pay attention to any unattended bags or packages, and get on with it.
I remember the Selfridges bomb, the bomb on the rail line between Brookwood and Woking, the Canary Wharf bomb, the bus that blew up along the Strand... all ones that people I know were caught up in. Only a few years ago, a lone nut decided to nailbomb parts of London associated with ethnic minorities and queers - the bomb blowing up the Admiral Duncan pub in Soho affected me deeply, not least of all because Richard's work is just round the corner from it and one of his co-workers only narrowly escaped injury. But we survived. The pub is still standing, and features a memorial to the people who died - and I urge anyone interested in queer history to go there and see.
We've had terrorists, nuts and loons for longer than I've even been alive. This is just another one of those things. It's tragic for the families of the people killed, but they can't get us all. They didn't manage it in WWII. They won't manage it now.
P.S. I don't often agree with him, but Go Ken!
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no subject
Date: 2005-07-08 02:43 am (UTC)However, this was not 9/11; it was not even on the same scale as Madrid. 20 years ago, incidents exactly like any one of the attacks today occurred on a regular basis in London - people learned to deal with it, get on with their lives, carry on. It is somewhat unprecedented to have four such attacks simultaneously, and one had to wonder if Londoners have lost that sense of resiliance after a few years of quiet, but apparently not. Again, we get on with our lives, because to act otherwise would be exactly what the terrorists want.
Everyone I saw in London today was just going about their business as well as they could with no tube or bus service (another state not unfamiliar to the locals.) I failed to notice anyone "burning with fear" - maybe I wasn't looking hard enough. Do the maths - out of 10 million people, 700 are injured or worse, in the first terrorist attack to claim casualties in some years. You take shorter odds just crossing the road in London, and 30 years' experience has taught Londoners to put events like this in perspective.
Don't misunderstand me - I'm angry and pissed off that anyone would do a thing like this to innocent people, and on my patch too. My thoughts are with the injured and bereaved (although I don't know anyone who even knows someone directly affected by this - unlike 9/11.) Some peoples' lives have been changed forever, others ended abruptly, for a cause that can never justify the means. But London doesn't need everyone fretting and worrying and hand-wringing, it's just one of those things that happens. The world's sympathy is gratefully received, but tomorrow it's business as usual.