The Woolwich Attacks and the Reaction

The second most sickening thing about yesterday’s knife attack in Woolwich, is the amount of racists that have come out of the woodwork because of it.

It maddens me how there is a sizeable amount of Brits out there who, to put it quite bluntly, are complete and utter morons. But I’m not here to name and shame. I’ll leave it to the author of this brilliant blog.

Another issue I have is with the reaction of a small section of people, who are expressing outrage with the apparently appalling behavior of members of the public in the aftermath of the attack.

Yes, those “shocking” and “disgraceful” members of the public who dared to stay calm after the murder and not risk their lives and provoke the situation further, by confronting two big, armed and dangerous “terrorists”.

Those outrageous individuals, who stood resiliently, showed no fear and waited for the trained members of police to arrive and handle the situation properly; before giving important evidence that could aid the officers and bring these men to justice. How terribly awful of them.

The fact of the matter is, the attack happened so quickly that the poor victim had already passed before anyone could even think about stepping in to help.

And even if there was time, could anyone honestly look me in the eye and say they would have mustered up the courage and gone running in to try and overpower two large men, with knives and guns on them?

Any decent human being would have offered help if they could. But it was clear it wasn’t possible this time.

Would these people be happy if instead, the members of public seen in ITV footage were screaming, hysterical and running around like headless chickens causing a panic? Would they have preferred them to lose their calm, further antagonise the attackers, and run from the scene thereby abandoning the victim and showing no resilience to two individuals representing a warped, extremist version of Islam?

If there is any outrage out there, it should be directed at the attackers and the people who hijack the incident for their right wing views. Not at members of the public, and not at the Muslim or black community.