Letters: Random acts of terrorism
Re “We’re safer than we think,†Opinion, April 17
I agree wholeheartedly with Doyle McManus. People need to remember that even with this act of terrorism in Boston, we live in the most peaceful time in human history.
No more Patriot Acts and no more gun restrictions. We must take back our rights and not let them slip away under the pretense of safety.
People need to understand that almost all of us aren’t in danger, though no one’s safety can ever be guaranteed. We need to deal with the fact that these things happen (rarely), and we shouldn’t give up rights to prevent another tragedy.
Uldarico Estrada
Lynwood
The Boston Marathon bombing is a tragedy. But there is something profoundly self-indulgent about our collective response to it, including the interfaith service at which the president spoke, flags lowered to half-staff and tributes at sporting events.
Why is it that these dead and wounded call for a national outpouring of grief, while the many daily tragedies — violent, senseless deaths of innocent people — do not?
The answer leads us to only one conclusion: Our mourning for the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings is mostly about us; we are mourning the loss of our (false) sense of security, defending our sense of having been attacked as a group.
We are mourning because these deaths rip away the insulation that usually protects us from feeling vulnerable when bad things happen quietly and singly.
Alexandra Jaffe
Lakewood
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