(no subject)

I'm continuing to catch up here.

I was very shocked by the terrorist attacks in the US on the 11th. Like most Britons, I'm sadly used to hearing of terrorist attacks on random people; maybe even desensitised to them. But seeing the events in New York unfold on TV was far worse than anything I've seen before. I know that far more people die in wars, or famine, or earthquakes, but the immediacy and continuity of the TV coverage in this case made it feel much closer.

I have two photos of those towers - one from the middle of the plaza, one looking directly up the towers, their edges converging towards the centre of the picture; another more conventional, with a 'plane flying harmlessly over them. They're still on my web site. Some have been removing photographic records of them, for instance in TV shows set in New York. I'm not going to participate in this kind of revisionism, though I wonder whether I should add a note of some kind to them.

Finally I would like to say that I'm worried by the American government's response. Invading Afghanistan doesn't strike me as being a sensible way to deal with terrorism. It's not at all clear that the regime there is a popular one. I'm not even sure whether it knowingly supported terrorism. However, I think it very likely that a war against Afghanistan will kill far more innocent civilians than bin Laden and likeminded terrorists ever did. This would not be "infinite justice" or any kind of justice at all. I'm also worried for selfish reasons - I fear that it will be seen by many Muslims with existing grievances against America as an attack on their faith, and that it will win more people to bin Laden's cause, resulting in further terrorist attacks on America and its allies. I don't know how to beat terrorism, but I think that it's better to use the law - and to deal with the grievances that drive some people to it, if those grievances are justified.