Killing your own

What a pinup boy this fellow is. The elite special forces hunter. The kind of guy you want your government to have on hand to deal with the terrorists. The recruiter’s wet dream.

And yet.

This fellow slaughtered a hundred of his own people, sending a peaceful nation into shock and millions around the world asking “Why?”

In one day he not only broke the macabre records of lone gunmen such as Martin Bryant, he made a grisly high score that topped the total tallies of the previous three leaders combined. And, like them, he did it without much serious opposition. Sure, the government square in Oslo is now cordoned off and crawling with police, likewise the hell island of Utoya, but when this fellow set off a car bomb and shot down 85 young people, the security forces were elsewhere.

Which is as it should be. The hallmark of a free and peaceful society is that it is not overpoliced and supersupervised. The citizens are trusted to go about their business, to elect their leaders, to build a better world. And, by all accounts, Norway is a model society, a shining example of harmony and happiness.

The “how” is no problem. The murderer surrendered, admitted his actions, his home is being scoured for evidence, and the pieces are being put together. What is puzzling is the “why” of this terror act.

Well, it’s not really a puzzle. Using a social networking site, the killer published a video, photographs and a long manifesto. He was targeting Marxists and Islamic immigrants.

So why, why, why were the people he killed none of the above? Those who were killed in the explosion and those he shot to death were people much like himself in everything but attitude. It makes no sense.

Well, let me sidetrack a little. Years ago, my grandfather died, and the family assembled to say farewell, do a little grieving and sharing and bonding. We took comfort in each other. One member was gone, but the family continued, toddlers running around the slow feet of the silverhairs.

My aunt and uncle and their three boys were there. Middle-aged boys like me. They had moved away from the family’s mild Christianity to embrace a more dogmatic sect. This never stopped us enjoying each others’ company, and some of the best memories of my childhood centre on my brother and I scamping around with our three cousins.

There was another cousin, a much younger daughter who had arrived unexpectedly, as so often happens, and had been adored and loved by all, especially her mother who must have sometimes despaired of her three rampaging boys.

Boys now grown into sober adulthood, with families of their own, and we chatted and caught up with the years as we remembered Pop, now lying stiff and formal in his coffin as he had never been in life.

But where was the darling young cousin? Nobody mentioned her, nobody explained her absence.

She had left the sect, and the sect had shunned her, closing the door and forgetting her existence. I felt like chastising my aunt, “I’m not a Christian, let alone a believer in your nutty religion, and yet here you are smiling and talking with me, when you won’t even mention the name of the daughter you loved so much.”

They saw her as a traitor, betraying the core values of their faith. I saw these petty points of dogma as ridiculous affectations, nonsense that no sane person could hold dear, and my sympathy lay entirely with my apostate cousin.

And that’s what is so hard to understand about this Norwegian massacre. How can anybody get their priorities so completely arse about? If family and folk are important, then where is the sense in turning against them? Is some stupid notion so vitally precious that you shun and shoot your own siblings?

And it is stupid. Norway might have centuries of proud history, but fjords and mountains and icey seas cannot keep out the world. They didn’t stop the Vikings from roaming the known world out to America and Constantinople, so how can they keep Indians and Turks away now that travel is a few hours in a comfortable seat, rather than weeks or months of salt fish in a longboat?

I have a Norwegian ancestor. A sailor who left his ship in the Victorian goldrush and never went home again. Maybe amongst the dead of Utoya lies a distant cousin. In fact, I would be astonished if I could not trace a long chain of kinship back and forth across the centuries to more than a few of the slain. The blood staining the water is my own.

I think the lesson here is that no matter how much we believe in ourselves, our family, our politics, our culture, our folk, we are not the One True Way. We are a part of the whole, and if others see things differently to us, maybe they have the right of it and we should examine our own views.

I hope that Norway does not become a more closed and security-conscious society from this. I hope that policemen armed with machineguns do not guard the streets and holiday islands, scowling at those who look different. Or the same.

I hope that the global outpouring of grief and support fills a few hard hearts with compassion and tolerance and understanding. For these sad days, and for ever, we are all Norwegian.