The preliminary report of the Manchester Arena Inquiry draws attention to failings of the on-site security team on the evening of the event. The problem runs deeper than that. The failings began long ago. We need to understand exactly what those failings were, and are.
In the make-believe land of Nayeif, openly armed men and women walk the streets unchallenged, their weapons flagrantly brandished in plain sight. The nation is proud of its freedom and of its citizens’ genteel restraint. Violent deaths are rare, as one would expect in any civilised society. People go about their daily business, accepting and tolerant of others, politely exchanging pleasantries and passing the time of day.
Every so often, however, something less pleasant transpires. Occasionally, there is a brutal shooting. Everyone shakes their head in puzzlement. What can have gone wrong? No-one in their peaceful, civilized culture would dream of committing such an atrocity. The balance of the gunman’s mind must have been disturbed. Perhaps he was radicalized. Yes, that’s it. Radicalized. Something happened, just to that one man, whirling him around to stand in diametric opposition to the harmonious Nayeifian way of life. There must be wicked people among the citizens of Nayeif, their hidden agenda to radicalize our innocent youth. Everyone must be on his guard. Each man must hunt the radicalized ones down. They must start an anti-radicalization movement, to avoid similar tragedies in the future.
One thing is absolutely beyond question. The barbaric murder cannot possibly have arisen from the fact that everyone carries a loaded gun as part of their daily routine. Everyone in Nayeif knows that to be true, because carrying loaded guns is part of their culture. It is a tradition dating back to the time of their forefathers. To change it would be to renounce their heritage; to betray their birthright and to comprise their rightful seat in heaven when they duly pass away and face judgment from their maker.
The make-believe land of Nayeif is full of loaded weapons, borne by those who rarely fire them. But the weapons are there. And they are loaded. They are very easy to fire, should someone decide to do so.
In the real world of twenty-first century Earth, men and women are free to believe in accordance with their learned cultures. They walk the streets unchallenged, their beliefs brandished proudly - often, loudly - in plain sight and earshot. Their holy text calls for the death of all those who do not share their beliefs, but few are motivated by that mandate to commit suicide and murder. Each nation is proud of its freedom and of its citizens’ genteel restraint from acting upon a literal reading of their preferred holy texts. Violent deaths are rare, as one would expect in any civilized society, but they do happen. People go about their daily business, accepting and tolerant of others, politely exchanging pleasantries and passing the time of day.
From time to time, however, something less pleasant transpires. Occasionally, there is a brutal suicide bombing. Everyone shakes their head in puzzlement. What can have gone wrong? No-one in their peaceful, civilized culture would dream of committing such an atrocity. The balance of the suicide bomber’s mind must have been disturbed. Perhaps he was radicalized. Yes, that’s it. Radicalized. Something happened, just to that one man, whirling him around to stand in diametric opposition to the nation’s harmonious way of life, with its fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect for, and tolerance of, those with different faiths and beliefs. There must be wicked people among the citizens of the nation, their hidden agenda to radicalize the country’s innocent youth. Everyone must be on his guard. Each man must hunt the radicalized ones down. They must start an anti-radicalization movement, to avoid similar tragedies in the future.
One thing is absolutely beyond question. The barbaric suicide-murder cannot possibly have arisen from the fact that everyone believes the literal truth of their holy text, including its injunction to slay as many unbelievers as you can. Everyone in the nation knows that to be true, because following their beliefs in their daily lives is part of their culture. It is a tradition dating back to the time of their forefathers. To change it would be to renounce their heritage; to betray their birthright and to comprise their rightful seat in heaven when they duly pass away and face judgment from their maker.
The real world of twenty-first century Earth is full of minds capable of following their holy texts’ injunction to commit murder in the name of a deity. The vast majority do not go on to murder. A few do, however. It is very easy for them to justify doing so.
Action could have prevented the 2017 Manchester suicide bombing years before Christopher Wild’s alert was ignored by poorly trained, inexperienced security staff at the Manchester Arena. We could have acted collectively, long before Salman Abedi was born. We could have put in place a healthy programme of rational education for young people, making clear the difference between actual fact and fictional holy text. But we have not done so, because we are too busy bending over backward to shower respect upon those who assert that the fantastic is true. Often, the reason for the professed ‘respect’ is pure pragmatism - we kowtow to religious bullying because we do not want our windows broken. It is ironic that such cowardly accommodationism makes it easier for misguided would-be martyrs like Abedi to carry out their self-interested crimes. The Arena security guards were worried about accusations of discrimination if they challenged Abedi. Why, we might now ask, did they not prioritise public safety over their own fears of reprisal? Perhaps it was because they did not appreciate either the immediacy or the scale of the threat.
Salman Abedi was a Muslim. That means he followed the religion of Islam, whose holy text is the Qur’an. In that book, those who die while slaying non-Muslims are promised rich rewards in heaven, to where they will be fast-tracked without having to spend years buried in the ground. The religion of Islam is comparatively young, its claimed prophet having died in AD632. However, there has been plenty of time for the civilized, rational world to react to its rise, and spread protective common sense through education. All we need to do is instil, in young people, the teaching that reality is best understood through science and clear, rational thinking, not through ancient texts and superstition. Salman Abedi could easily have been taught that he would not go to heaven for blowing up a foyer full of schoolgirls. He was born in Manchester in 1994 and was educated in UK state schools and Salford University. Throughout his formative years, there was ample time to call him out on any incipient aspiration to martyrdom. To have done so would have saved twenty-two lives, including that of eight-year-old Saffie-Rose Roussos, who bled to death from injuries caused by Abedi’s bomb, fully aware of her situation and asking medical staff if she was going to die.
Salman Abedi was 22 when he died. He threw away three quarters of his life. His death is as tragic as that of his victims. He is a victim himself, of a cruel, false ideology that dupes its adherents into acts that are extremely harmful and without benefit. Never mind the argument that most Muslims do not blow people up. Most alcoholic drivers do not kill people in road accidents, but a few do and that is why drinking and driving is, quite rightly, illegal. Islam is an expensive luxury the world cannot afford. It needs to be stopped, through a world-wide programme of rational education that should have started long ago.
We have to start now.
