Victimization

My attention was drawn tothis forum postingtonight describing a terrible experience a group of fivehad at Grand Bazaar -and to think that I was actuallythere with a friend just mere hours before...

The thing is that we're a country known for talkingat length (sometimes passionately) about theissue at hand whilst being unable to effectively deal with it owing to incompetence,distractions, ora general loss of interest in the subject after an unusually short while. And then we forget all about it and life resumesas normalfor mostpeople, save and exceptfor the victims who are withoutany guaranteeof receivingjustice. And wewatch on helplessly associetycontinues to degenerate before us.

The fact of the matter is thatwe're not truly powerless to effect change, not really, not always - it's just thatas a people we've simply beenconditioned to believe that it'ssomeone else'sresponsibilityto deal with the problems withthe rest of ushaving little or no say.For the most part,the thought thatmaybe we could do something about itourselves probably never even crossed our minds.

The way forward involves morethanus debating the topicin isolated groups and forums - it calls for everyone to collectively take a stancethat cannotbe easily dismissed or overlooked by those accountable. Yes, that initiativewill take time and effort, and there will be obstacles along the way,butto do otherwiseisto propagate the injustice by not havingtheconcernsappropriately resolved.And it is my hope that this incident will act as a catalyst for that sort of action.

My sympathies to the victims.