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In Reply to: Re: Hiroshima posted by goth88 on January 21, 2003 at 21:40:33:
Coincidentally, I met several people who were survivors of a big disaster at sea. Two of them are now together as a couple. When the ship was going down, he said to her, a total stranger, "if we make it out of this alive, I'll buy you dinner in a fine restaurant."
Romantic? The media thinks so. You be the judge:
As the ship listed heavily and water filled the decks, their survival instincts took over. Climbing out of the corridors and making their way to the upper deck was no easy feat. They pushed forward as fast as they could. They did not stop to help anyone. They would not have made it if they had taken a second longer. To this day they are haunted by the cries of help from other passengers. They ask themselves over and over if there was not something they could have done for them. "Why us and not them?" Were they now alive and living "happily ever after" at the price of someone else's death.
Unfortunately, due to the nature of these boards, it's sometimes necessary to lace what you are saying with all kinds of disclaimers. You so have to cover your ass around here when you speak up. If the F. can be likened to a disaster, I wouldn't take it too personally that you were teased or put down for your views. Bulletin boards can be war zones sometimes. As we all struggle to find meaning and healing, we sometimes try to do it at the price of invalidating others. We ask, "why us and not them?" We absolve. We blame.
Your views are important, because you remind us that it is not necessary to find validation for one's own suffering through invalidating someone else's. Fixing the blame is a lot easier than fixing the problem. Measuring how much guilt and blame goes to whom is always controversial (not that I am saying that is what everyone is trying to do although it does seem like it at times).
There isn't a textbook method to finding healing. We were all affected in different ways, and we all have a different sense of responsibility about what our part was in contributing to the F. movement. Some need to clear their own conscience through self-flagellation. Then there are some, who seem unaware, or in denial about any culpability for their own long time contribution to the F.
I'll probably get in deep shit from all sides for saying this, but I often see the SG black-and-white casting of blame on FG parents who chose to join, in a karmic way. I find the way SGs blame their parents for letting them be born and grow up in the F., not too different from the way FGs used to blame their own parents for the abuse they suffered. Some FGs came from very dysfunctional homes, where they could also rightfully say to their parents, "you chose to become a [fill in] and because of that you put me in a situation where I was abused; you did not take care of my education and needs; you punished me harshly for the stupidest things; you forced me to get brainwashed by [fill in]; you didn't let me listen to the music I wanted or have the friends I wanted; you didn't help when uncle molested me"
Of course, I am aware that there was sanctioned, systematic institutionalized abuse, and SGs were put through things unparalleled even in some of the most abusive dysfunctional homes. I am just saying that I see it in a cyclic karmic way, and that SGs are in a sense carrying on or repeating what FGs did.
This is a process. A lot of us, SG or FG, are a lot wiser now than we were a few years back. Sounding off and discussing is bringing us to new realizations. Have patience, my friend.
