Toronto Mayor @JohnTory: "I hope that we will, as a city, remind ourselves of the fact that we are admired around the world for being inclusive and for being accepting and understanding and considerate."pic.twitter.com/ka9BaHAKwx
— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) April 23, 2018
The Toronto van attack is still a developing story. But big city politicians have an automatic default after an attack that might involve terrorism. (Of the politically correct kind.)
"I hope that we will, as a city, remind ourselves of the fact that we are admired around the world for being inclusive and for being accepting and understanding and considerate," Toronto Mayor John Tory said.
Instead of reacting against the attacker, Mayor Tory engages in the preemptive politically correct shaming of anyone who might think of saying or thinking the wrong thing.
I don't know that anyone outside (or especially inside) Toronto goes around admiring it for "being inclusive". It's a childish hectoring strategy of the kind you would use on children. And that's how politicians see people. As children to be nudged, shamed and berated into behaving the way that their betters expect them to.
Under these conditions, the actual details of the attack become almost irrelevant.
Politicians and the media assume the worst (Islamic terror) while denying it and preemptively lecturing the public without ever using any of the relevant terms. Instead there is a kind of vague beating around the bush. Buzzwords like tolerance, inclusive and accepting circulate.
Not to mention, "understanding".
How does one apply "understanding" to deliberately running over people? Are people expected to understand that these things just happen? Are they expected to be considerate of the attackers?