On March 22nd, 2016, two nail bombs exploded in Brussels, Belgium. One bomb was located at Brussels Airport and the other was placed in a metro station. 31 people died and over 100 people are injured, making it the deadliest act of terrorism in Belgian history.
A little more than a week prior, a car containing multiple explosives was used in a terrorist attack in Ankara, Turkey. 37 people died and, similar to the Brussels attack, over 100 were injured. Less than one month prior, on February 17th, 2016, another car bomb exploded in Ankara, killing 30 and injuring 60.
I first heard about the Brussels attack on Facebook. My entire news feed was full of posts tagged with #prayforbrussels, reaching out to victims and citizens of Belgium. Facebook also informed me of the attacks in Ankara, but from the trending sidebar and not from any posts that were made by my friends or the pages that I follow.
In November 2015, I saw the same thing happen with the Paris and Beirut attacks, which occurred only one day apart. Posts flooded my timeline with people changing their profiles to the French-flag filter and writing posts ending with #prayforparis. Not a single post mentioned the attacks in Lebanon and Facebook never created a filter of the Lebanese flag either.
Obviously, there is nothing wrong with showing your support on social media, but why is there such a disparity between the number of posts made for Western countries and those made for all others?
When it comes to major news outlets like NPR, CNN, and BBC, the amount of coverage for all of the attacks seems to be fairly equal. NPR even published this article shortly after the Brussels attacks chronicling other terrorist attacks that have occurred recently.
The information is out there, so where is the disconnect between media outlets and the general audience? Perhaps it could be that many of us have a pre-conceived notion that countries like Lebanon and Turkey are unstable and attacks should be expected. We could also find non-Western countries harder to relate to because of the line that the world likes to draw between Europe and Asia, separating the West from the East and the relevant from the distant, unknown lands.
Regardless of where terrorist attacks occur, they rip life away from innocent people simply to cause more chaos. Recognizing the scope of how many attacks go on every year, every month, or every day around the world is devastating and trying to keep up with the constant senseless loss of life around the world is incredibly exhausting.
Expecting everyone to constantly keep up with the devastation that strikes every day is unrealistic, but take a second the next time when you want to post about a terrorist attack or add a filter to your profile picture in solidarity. Maybe consider ending your post with #prayfortheworld instead of specifying a country or city because, in the terrible world that we live in, many areas need your thoughts, not just one in particular.
Even though some parts of the world may seem more relevant or reachable, innocent people are suffering everywhere. The color of one’s skin, where they live, their religion, or how much money they have doesn’t mean the loss of their life is any less important and this is something that we all need to come to realize.
