“THOSE BIRDS WERE SINGING JUST AS LOUDLY AND JUST AS SWEETLY WHEN THE BULLETS WERE FINDING THEIR TARGETS.” Christopher Hitchens on the “mawkishness, sloppiness, and false sentiment” of our reaction to the shootings at Virginia Tech:
Almost everybody in the country seems to have taken this non-event as permission to talk the starkest nonsense. And why not? Since the slaughter raised no real issues, it was a blank slate on which anyone could doodle.
If I understand the article correctly, by “non-event”, Hitchens is referring to the 33rd bell toll, and not the shooting spree itself. At least, that’s what I hope he means.