Monday, August 31, 2020

The Other Overwhelming Sad

On top of and underlying the sadness I wrote about on Friday, was the other huge sadness that most New Zealanders were feeling. That I could not bring myself to write about last week. All week I was feeling love, horror, fear, grief, compassion, for the victims of the Christchurch mosque murderous slaughters as nearly 90 survivors and family members gave victim impact statements in court.

At the same time I felt stomach-churning horror at the thought of being the mother of that white son, who is the same age as my white son. The knowledge that none of my sons would do such a thing, does not ameliorate the nausea, when the knowledge that he-who-I-will-not-name is a son of our shared white culture of privilege and arrogance.

Even the sentence of actual life-until-you-die imprisonment (first time *ever* in NZ) has left me in a state of horror - yes, what other option could be considered? But he's 29 - he faces so many decades of non-life in jail. What a waste, what a dreadful way to be. And his mother and grandmother - how dreadful are their lives. And yet, what he did is just so awful, so so so awful. I can't stop thinking of how I could live with the knowledge that my son had done that. I think I would kill myself.

It was comforting to have the son who is the same age visit this weekend, and to hear his thoughts around this horrible slaughter, and have it confirmed that he a good, kind, moral man that would never commit such an atrocity. Plus, he makes me laugh.


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