There is no window into the soul of evil.
You can't see empty. You do feel it, which is the aim of cruel and senseless intentions. The content is discernible and disturbing: blood and bodies. The props are simple: guns and grenades. The desired effect is easily achieved: anxiety, anger, and deep-set fear.
Violence of the ilk perpetrated in Paris shakes us, literally. It is revelatory of a new and emerging world order that shouldn't surprise us; its reverberations, after all, are neither new nor infrequent.
Rational folks will want answers. There are no easy ones.
We see cowardice on an unimaginable level; the bad guys see another “W” in the win column. We crave a knockout response; the bad guys are buoyed by the accumulative effect of jabs that bloody and buckle a bigger and mightier perceived enemy.
The bad guys, dare I say, are winning on points.
* * *
The horrible images out of Paris don't fade easily. They are not meant to, and they shouldn't. And as they play over and over again in my mind, I wonder: Will this event soon be yesterday's news, or will the collective will of the international community finally reveal itself, and with one voice - and one military - resolve to do everything within its means to eradicate this abhorrent extremism and all it stands for?
Where is that voice? Why is the condemnation and cogent and nonnegotiable resolve of a world community not expressed loudly, clearly, and in fateful terms, and then dealt with in the same manner?
Can we no longer ache as one heart? Is our blood not the same color?
* * *
Let's face it: Our concert halls, our restaurants and our stadiums are no less exposed than those in Paris or London, or Beirut. At some point, we will be next.
I share the idea that we can't kill our way out of this terrible problem. But the might of many nations - unlike an indistinct coalition - can be a powerful thing. That power can eliminate terror groups that aspire only to rape, to brutalize, and to torture other humans, that don't hide but shout their desire to eradicate ethnic and religious populations merely because their views and beliefs do not align with their radicalism, and that are bent on erasing not only generations of people but their cultural history, too.
Countries and governments that harbor such groups can be dealt with decisively, not with tired, hollow, diplomatic rhetoric.
Pipelines of dangerous propaganda can be cut off - not by a narrow coalition of countries, but by the united savvy of a greater family of nations that understands the stakes.
* * *
How disaffected must a 20-something teen be to unload bullets from an automatic rifle and lob grenades into restaurants and theaters at innocent citizens, children included, with all the collectedness of a lifetime assassin?
How?
It's hard to fathom the scale of horror that those people inside the Bataclan nightclub and concert hall experienced. Built in 1864 and restored in the 1970s, the venue in eastern Paris is regarded as a historic monument. Prince, Oasis, and Lou Reed performed there. Stand-up comedy, café-theater, and pop concerts are regular fare.
It is never again to be remembered for any of that; its new history is that of a killing field.
As a people, we're clinging to a fraying thread at the end of which hangs our free way of life and our innocence. It's time to reclaim those important commodities. It's time to do more to assure our children and their children a future of peaceful possibilities, not a separate menu at dinner denoting that day's expected threat level.
Let's get to a point again where a concert can be a concert and a soccer match can be a soccer match, free of pat-downs and Kevlar, without fear of dying.
More than 100 people, including at least one American, a college student studying abroad, lost their lives in Paris; more than 300 were maimed and injured, some suffering wounds they will wear and deal with for the rest of their lives.
Random, senseless, scare-tactic violence. Jabs. Bloodshed. Body bags.
Have we had enough?