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July 07, 2005

You, sirs, are true vulgarians

The UK has a longer history of grappling with terrorism than any of its G8 counterparts, its security forces are held in higher esteem than any country's save perhaps Israel's, and it has embraced post-9/11 counterterrorism measures with zeal and conviction exceeded only by the United States. And still, this massive operation was planned and executed, seemingly to monstrous perfection. I am somewhat awestruck, and deeply saddened of course, that they pulled it off.

But Londoners — of all the people to pull this shit on! Did Al Qaeda (or whatever ridiculous name this offshoot thereof has given itself) really think they'd get the same reaction they got from the Madrillenos (this oddly pro-Spanish analysis notwithstanding)? They need a historian on staff. They misunderstand the British psyche to the same degree that the hand-wringing whingers who fret aloud about an anti-Muslim backlash misunderstand, I think, the London psyche.

In my experience London is many, many times more racially integrated than any North American city (except New York, but that proviso applies to just about everything). Nowhere, for instance, have I seen such a rainbow of skin colours speaking in the national broadcaster's version of the native accent; nowhere have I seen more religions, races and ethnicities sitting down to business lunches.

There's no accounting for the yobs, of course, but nor is there any need to worry about them. There are hateful people who will see this act as validation of their hate — so what? Their hatred is prehistoric, perhaps prenatal. None of them live in London. They couldn't ever afford to, on account of they're too stupid and full of hate. (And I don't imagine you'll find much sympathy for London in that crowd anyway.) Anti-Muslim sentiment is a non-issue. Indeed, I find very odd the degree to which Tony Blair obsesses about it. This should go down as the simplest news story of the year: crazed psychopaths killed people; those left behind raised their middle fingers and went to work.

Britain is an island; there are only so many ways in and out. The people who did this are either dead or they're going to be caught. The Brits will have evidence coming out their ears, I imagine: the bus explosion will almost certainly have been caught on camera, and it's quite possible that the perpetrators were filmed alighting and/or disembarking. These terrorists will be given fair trials and treated humanely and thrown in prison for the rest of their lives. Their legacy will be a redoubling of our efforts to rain gruesome death upon their compatriots.

Posted by Chris Selley at July 7, 2005 10:32 PM