Mogo often wonders why I read the terrible stories, the ones in which the brutal deaths of children are recorded in details that make the bile run up from my stomach into my mouth, the stories in which I can hear the phantom children begging, pleading, screaming.
The thought of them begging their mothers or fathers for mercy is the one that makes me cold, seizes my spine.
It’s hard to quantify, the reasoning behind scanning news feeds for those stories which hurt, the ones in which the truly innocent pay for crimes they haven’t even had the chance to commit. Why sacrifice my time, my mood, my thoughts for these acts of terror and evil that are so easily ignored?
I read, and read and read in order to mourn these children. To acknowledge that yes, they existed, they were, that they deserved better than was given, that they are real. I read to hear their voices, to bear witness to their agony. Someone needs to bear witness.
It feels wrong to ignore their stories, to move quickly along. Sure, it serves no real purpose, other than to remind me what I never, ever want to be. But to disregard them because it is too hard or depressing seems unfair, and mean. These were little girls, little boys. All they wanted was love. All they received, was pain, from adults too deluded or ruined to stop themselves.
I hear their tiny voices, ringing out, begging for knowledge, for warmth. I can’t bear to turn away.
Spin Me I Pulsate 
That poor, poor baby. I don’t understand how anyone could do something like that. Even at my worst, I would have stepped in front of a bus before I hurt my son.
i get you. i feel compelled, as well, even though a part of me feels dirty reading those stories because they pander, in a sense, to the worst ambulance-chaser in all of us. but they do allow for bearing witness, to those poor little souls who never got a chance.
to the idea, also, that there really is no rhyme or reason to things. no child deserves what happened to that little girl. and when i feel angry at platitudes like “every event has a purpose” – which to me suggest that suffering is somehow earned, or meant to teach me something – i think of events like this one and think, nope. nope, some things are just wrong, and sad, and need to be honoured as such, not milquetoasted into a nice lesson.
you’re right, we can’t turn away from their stories. These little souls were here and we did not protect them enough. and like you say, we never want to be those parents…
oh..what Bon said, exactly. me too.
Reblogged this on Freethinkers Notes and commented:
What exactly constitutes as a human?
Does the process of defining this word require assumption?