Boston

The bombings at the Boston Marathon yesterday were horrific. I never thought I'd see footage like that in my entire life. The images coming out of Boston looked like they were from a war zone. I felt so sad seeing something so joyful turn into an afternoon of pain and suffering.

Twitter was swamped with people sending thoughts and prayers to Boston. "#PrayForBoston" and "#BostonMarathon" were trending within minutes. Twitter was also swamped with people starting to play the blame game. Muslims were upset because "#Muslims" was on the national trend list. A tweet that I saw said, "Did #WhiteBoy trend when Lanza was caught in December?" Another one read, "Anyone who thinks that Muslims are responsible for this obviously forget McVeigh. #shame #RememberOKC."

One of the people I follow on Twitter, an army wife from Colorado Springs, said that she was tired of people blaming "her American people" for the bombing and she wanted an apology from ABC, NBC, and CBS. I asked her what she meant (I'd been watching all of those, as well as FOX, to try to get all the information) because I didn't understand. She said that those three networks had already said it was the "conservative right" that was to blame. I disagreed with this, seeing as I had been watching those for the last hour and had heard nothing of the sort, but I thought her reaction was a perfect example of the way people react in the wake of tragedies like this: they don't want it to be one of "their" people and they take everything they hear and twist it to fit what they need to hear at that time. It's easier to blame some other group, some other skin color, some other country. I don't fault this woman for her initial reaction; it was a horrible day and our gut reactions are not always the most reasonable. I wrote back to her saying that I hope it's not someone identified with a particular party, too.

Maksim Chmerkovskiy, a professional dancer on the hit TV show "Dancing with the Stars," tweeted, "Hard to dance on [a] day like today, but I hope we'll show whomever is responsible for #bostonbombing that we're stronger and unaffected!" I really do think that the show must go on and it's important that we get together and stay strong. But unaffected? No. We must allow ourselves to be affected by this event to ensure that we do come out the other side stronger.

So. I am not a fan of blaming people. I know that other people are. Some of the most popular people to blame for the Boston bombings have been President Obama, Muslims in general, and terrorists. But is it the right time? I feel like I did after the tragedy at Sandy Hook: is right now the appropriate time to talk about what our government "should have" done? While I understand that we will absolutely need to discuss this, are the first 24 hours the right time?

For now, let's hug our relatives, help out strangers, and pray for the victims of the bombings in Boston. If we allow ourselves to start blaming each other and arguing about who the "mastermind" behind all of this was, it doesn't matter who the person who did this is: they have already won. If we allow them to bomb our cities, turn us against each other, and break our collective resolve, they win.

We cannot let them win. We must find the person who did this and bring them to justice. And we must work together.

Stay safe. Stay strong.

"Be the change you wish to be in the world." --Gandhi