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How do we decide who matters and who doesn't? Is it a question of distance? Of colour? Of race? Of religion?
Yes.
I can't tell whether your post is naive or rhetorical or something else. Were you an adult in 2005? It can't be something that you've only just noticed. It's the news. "We" care more when it's a. close to home and b. people "like us", whatever that means to each of us. We're more likely to remember holidays in Paris or have friends/family there now. We're more likely to be able to imagine ourselves there, doing the same things. It's pretty basic.
The sense of extreme injustice between the apparent value of lives near/far, white/brown, rich/poor, based on faith and culture etc is one of the causes of radicalisation. It's a huge and sickening horror. Especially for those that feel closer or more sympathetic to the less valued, less mourned lives. Although of course there is a great leap to go from outrage at injustice to inclination to mass murder.
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hoefla
What's happened in Paris is tragic, and this may be deemed politically incorrect. If so, sue me.
Social media is going crazy, TV is going crazy, the newspapers tomorrow (and for days to come) will have a field day. People praying for Paris. Posting pictures of the Eiffel Tower. All caring and considerate.
But what about the 43 people killed in Lebanon yesterday? I don't hear prayers for Beirut.
What about the hundreds killed in Syria today and yesterday and the day before and for the past 4 years? I don't see pictures of Aleppo.
What about India? What about Palestine? What about Aghanistan? What about Iraq? Or do only Western European and North American lives matter?
How do we decide who matters and who doesn't? Is it a question of distance? Of colour? Of race? Of religion?
Where were all the status updates and social media frenzy when 102 people were killed in a suicide attack in Turkey last month?