Pleased To Meet You

The Rolling Stones opened their 1968 album "Beggars Banquet" with the now very famous song "Sympathy for the Devil". It is a brilliantly performed song about the sinister pervasiveness of evil and the hypocrisy often connected to the power of evil. One of the most intriguing phrases that runs repeatedly through the song is "But what's puzzling you is the nature of my game", implying the complexity and complicity of evil in the world. Another catch phrase, "Pleased to meet you Hope you guess my name " that precedes the famous "But what's puzzling you Is the nature of my game", has a wry humour to it that adds a twist of mischief to the dark subject matter. The song was playing on my favorite classic rock station this morning, as I was musing about the emotional and psychological aftermath and impact of the tragic bombings at the Boston Marathon just one week ago. Violence is inherently evil and when it is on a big scale it quickly becomes incomprehensible and very disturbing. Indeed, we are puzzled by the nature of its game, as there are more questions than answers at this point. The brilliantly executed capture of the suspects that had more than a million people under a siege in their own city was reminiscent of science fiction movies with a western style twist of inevitability and precision. There is no precedent like it in modern American history. It left the country emotionally rattled and quite startled, even though it did not take away any of our determinations and spirit and Boston and its citizens came through with amazing resilience and courage. It is easy to think of evil in abstract terms. But an act of violence of this magnitude at a peaceful, joyous gathering makes evil very concrete and devastating in impact. But because there are so many questions left, the evil is also insidiously elusive, as to the why and the more precise who behind the monstrous deeds. So, evil seems to laugh at us , telling us in a very cocky way, oh," pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name." And for now, we do not know its exact name, or who precisely orchestrated it. I hope we get to the bottom of it, so it can stop its macabre dance of insults and deception and bring some much needed closure to the victims and their families.