It would be wrong of me to start blogging again without taking some kind of stock and recognition of the horrific last week that has passed.
Anders Behring Breivik was responsible for the ‘twin terror’ attacks on Norway, murdering seventy-six people in the most heartless of ways. Humanitarian remorse is replaced in him by pride and a sense of duty, in that he reportedly feels justified in his motives and methods. To me, and I hope to most, there is no justification or reason to slaughter innocent people in such a way and it comes as no surprise that comparisons are being made to Hitler. I find this somewhat a limited comparison, and I’m sure that Breivik would see it as a flattery. However, my feeling about the Norway tragedy is a just jaw-dropping wonder as to why? I cannot begin to think of the last thoughts, the family’s thoughts and his thoughts during that hour and now in the days after. Unfortunately there is no justice fitting for a man of this nature, nothing can repair what he’s done or replace what he has taken from so many.
Then there is the tragic death of Amy Whinehouse. The troubled, young star had a talent that will live beyond her mere twenty-seven years walking with us. Although her cause of death is still inconclusive and will be so for a few more weeks, it doesn’t stop speculation and accumulation of scattered facts and fictions that are piecing together the last few moments of her life, not unlike the incessant media scrutiny she faced in her daily life. It’s so sad that intrigue is found in others miseries, and that the obvious troubled life she lived was entertainment. Perhaps it was the extremity of her addiction and how it could be played out in front of the world that was so addictive to us. An unknown lifestyle to the nine ‘til five worker, or is it just a sadistic revel in others’ misery that makes our own not-so-perfect existences feel that bit better. Unfortunately in the celebrity obsessed, media fuelled world that we live in, I feel strongly in saying that if someone becomes famous for being something, they may unknowingly play to that character. Perhaps we are too quick to pigeon-hole people, I know I am guilty of this trait, not giving in to people’s reformed characters leaves little options and scene changes in their lives. Her father Mitch said she was the happiest she had ever been, it’s a shame we never got to see that side of her again before her tragic death.
Whatever way the curtain ended up falling on Amy, I just hope she is remembered for her emotive talent and not just as a media sensation.
