The T Word

So today there was yet another terror attack in London.  I only caught the end of the news report, but no mystery about filling in the blanks.  Mere details.  Only four dead -- not sure if the mystery person is counted among them.  Yes, it is a mystery.  Who, who, who could it be?  A middle-aged female dental hygienist?  A rogue Eagle Scout from Texas?  Only time will tell.

The official-sounding statement from the government referenced rule of law and tolerance and never succumbing and never being totally wiped out.  All very fine.  But it set a train of thought rolling.

An easy point, but I have a good example.  There is no place  for a mention of tolerance in a situation like this.  Tolerance can only refer to something that is obnoxious.  Nothing neutral can be tolerated.  So where exactly, here, would tolerance fit?  Nowhere.  Regardless of how merely annoying we find something, terrorism is of a different order.  The good example is this:  we do not tolerate the fact that one cloud, this one, has a different shape than another, that one. There may be a preference, somehow -- but how could there be any aversion? We tolerate that someone is kicking the back of our chair, or speaking in a loud rude voice.

We tolerate the fact that abortionists kill human fetuses legally.  Ah, the wacky irony -- destroy a bald eagle egg and you go to the penitentiary.  Truth is funnier than fiction.

So far, as with eagle eggs, we do not tolerate the actual exploits of terrorists.  We do tolerate their presence, in obvious potential.   We tolerate the individuals on our watch lists.

We somehow didn't die from our staple diet of poison.  I wonder if we will recover?


J