Mood:
caffeinatedTopic: "Forbidden Fruit"
Frodo often thinks about things that no one talks about. Sam once said to Frodo that every family has a "secret" that they never discuss, although everyone knows about it. "It" might be an aunt that has a real taste for John Barley-Corn, or a niece who happens to like girls as much as Frodo, or an uncle who died very suddenly, and without much explanation to the Hobbits and the Halflings.
No word imported into the English language ever carried the nuance of "kamikaze." Pilots who celebrated their religion by sacrificing themselves against the impending fleet of the Allies were kamikaze. The number of ships, and sailors, lost in the final weeks and months of World War II were staggering, but the psychological impact was enough to loosen the bond on the most destructive force imaginable. Hiroshima and Nagasaki occurred because "kamikaze" was a reality for which the Allies had no defense. Kamikaze ended only when the Emperor told the people of Japan that to continue the struggle would be an evil act.
"Suicide bomber" is a sanitary statement, stripped of any relationship to religion, or to duty. This evening, a young child was captured in a suicide vest in Palestine, and stripped of his weaponry. The media reports that his mother had been promised $23 for his sacrifice. Frodo has no idea if this is true, or if it even approximates what he actually said to his captors. What Frodo does know is that there is no reference to religion, to patriotism, or even to hatred of Israel. He is reported as having acted for money.
Evidence is now clear that the tragic bombings in London were conducted by suicide bombers. Frodo has listened to the reports, cried with the grieving families, and waited for preliminary information before speaking. It is clear that there is no defense, even in locales so frequently targeted for violence as London or Haifa, and that little has been done which lessens the threat of death and disfigurement to innocent peoples. It is not enough to say that government has done all it can.
For more than 60 years, two generations, the World of Middle Earth has been confronted by those who view death as a transition, rather than as an end. Death is not viewed in such circles as "loss," it is "entrance."
Kamikaze pilots were usually Shinto. Suicide bombers are most often Shiia Muslim. Those who celebrate the end of life as entrance to Heaven are Christian. Frodo supposes that these murderers are just giving us what we want.
Frodo truly hopes that those who murder innocents never enter an afterworld. Pain and nothingness are what Frodo believes are their just reward. Frodo also hopes that talking about suicide as a waste, a loss, the absence of reason, will convince others that it is not a "secret" worthy of any family anywhere. No sacrifice, no atonement, no reward, just a stupid and senseless act decried by all religions.
To date, no Islamic cleric anywhere in the world has issued a FATWA against those who committed, much less those who supported, the attacks of September 11, 2001. The "suicide" which was unleashed upon innocent people has never been officially condemned as unholy. There is no "Emperor" to call upon the faithful to lay down their arms. There is only the clerics, the one societal institution to which the faithful pay obedience. The clerics, who represent the one thing for which the faithful are willing to die.
Frodo wonders why a behavioral scientist, posing as Secretary of State, doesn't see the obvious?
Posted by loveysdaddyga
at 9:21 PM EDT
