Religious Stampede
Approximately 345 people were killed today during the yearly Hajj in Mecca. Does anyone else find it absolutely absurd that every single year people are killed during this part of their ritual? Why exactly doesn't the Saudi Arabian government enact measures to prevent this from happening? Why don't the pilgrims who are there demonstrate some common sense when they know what has occured in the past? I just can't fathom this type of behavior.
Update:
Not surprisingly, the pilgrims and Saudi government blame each other. Police officials say that many pilgrims ignored the warnings and notices posted all over the area, as well as advice to visit the sacred sites throughout the day, rather than all at once after the noon service. Pilgrims say that while there was plenty of security, they were poorly organized and seemed to ignore many of the problems as they were occuring.
While there must be some logistical strategies that the government could employ to help prevent this (although I'm sure it woudn't please the pilgrims), its clear that the biggest problem is trying to squeeze 2 million pilgrims into a space where each of them is only concerned with fulfilling their part of tradition. Fanaticism is trumping common sense. As one official said, it only takes two people to start one of these stampedes. So, although I think the government isn't doing enough (and this is coming from someone thousands of miles away, so my view probably isn't worth much), I'm not sure how you convince a mob of people to start thinking of others a little more. Let's hope next year's Hajj isn't as deadly.
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3 comments:
they do have 20,000 police officers, crowd control, helicopter surveillance, etc. i'd like to see you do better with that many people. honestly, if you've got better ideas, saudia arabia would be eternally grateful.
No offense, but a government that hosts the largtest Muslim pilgrimage every single year should have better ideas. Here's one: how about rope lines? How about not letting everyone take all of their luggage with them to further congest the area. How about setting up a staging area where the police let in only as many people as is safe until there is room again. If a 102,000 fans go to the Michigan/Michigan St. game every year, and no one has died due to trampling in its history, don't tell me it can't be done. Saudia Arabia just isn't trying hard enough. You would think that a large group of religious people would show a little more regard to human life.
Well, there's a few less suicide bombers.....
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