We can keep crying, we can keep getting shocked, we can fly our flags at half-mast, write little poems of sadness and pin them to flowers, light candles and march in silence, tie ribbons on bridges, hear our leaders express sorrow and decry the inhumanity of it all….we can keep doing this and more. Again and again. But ribbons and papers and cloth and candles never won wars. Nor will we. Nor will we.
I cannot act shocked and stunned by Paris…I’ve grown up with a dozen Parises occurring all around me. I’ve lived through them all my life. My first Paris was Delhi in 1984, my latest is Paris 2015. I try to feel if it’s any different who’s doing the killing. Hindus, or Sikhs or Muslims or Christians. I don’t. It doesn’t. But 33 of 39 years of bloodied headlines has numbed me to it. There’s just a cold anger that runs through me when I read the latest religious exploit. Anger and a sense of frustration at those who think words alone can win a war.
Talking won’t help, any more than making placards will. Wars are won by those most willing to shed blood, their’s and their enemies. Any guesses as to who that is in today’s world?
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About hbhatnagar
I need to fill this up with much better content than I had populated it with earlier. Why I write a blog maybe? I started blogging in 2009 or thereabouts. I was a newly turned atheist and wanted to converse with others of the same persuasion. We're not exactly a big population group in India! It didn't go very well and I sort of lost interest, posting a few things now and then.
I got a lot more regular over the last few months and have been posting almost daily since February '15. There were many reasons why I gradually became more regular in posting, but one way or the other, here I am! So this blog has taken shape, being at different points in time my showcase, my comedy club, my art gallery, my book club, my therapist, my close friend, my innermost self....but always my little corner of the world. You are all welcome to visit and I hope you stay awhile!
A few points about me because I don't want to lead anyone on(and trust me this does become an issue more often than I'd care to admit).
I'm Indian, the brown-skinned variety; if race, ethnicity or skin colour is an issue, you don't have to get to know me any more than what you see on my blog.
I'm 40, so if age is an issue, please be informed accordingly.
I was a doctor, an ophthalmic surgeon for 10 years before I quit practice.
hbhatnagar 
I couldn’t agree more . Cynical , I know , but that is just how it is.
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Posted by priyankamoraes | 23/11/2015, 2:08 PMIt’s a sad world when truth gets labeled cynicism
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 23/11/2015, 10:11 PMIt is , for that reason and many more . Who promised us a happy world anyway ?
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Posted by priyankamoraes | 23/11/2015, 10:15 PMEvery childhood story did
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 23/11/2015, 10:18 PMHappily ever after ones….right
Humpty dumpty is more like it ….you fall and nothing and no one can put you together again .
Those fairy tale writers are on some serious doses of happy hormones , liars !
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Posted by priyankamoraes | 23/11/2015, 10:24 PMMost fairy tales were rewritten to make them child-friendly. Little red riding hood was eaten by the wolf- end of story. No carpenter/hunter came to cut her out of the wolf’s stomach.
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 24/11/2015, 6:58 AMI think everyone processes their feelings in a different way. I think to become desensitised and skeptical is what is most tragic in any event. As for me, I have family living in Europe and when something like this happens, it feels close to me. And until I know where everyone is, everything is at a standstill. I wonder if your reaction would be the same if a close friend of yours was caught up in events. I don’t think that any outpouring of sympathy is meaningless. It tells me that we have something good in us. Having said that, wars haven’t helped and negotiating hasn’t helped. There must be a third way, but as you said, who will illuminate it for us?
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Posted by Sabiscuit | 14/11/2015, 7:55 PMI’ve had that too, and I know how it feels to have family caught in the middle of terrorist attacks. Sympathy can mean something if it moves beyond messages of support. “It isn’t people who stand up to be counted who make a difference, it’s the people who stay standing after being counted that do.” I’m a cynic, I know. But Europe moved beyond large scale violence after bleeding itself dry in two world wars. Not till we’re destroyed by violence do we understand its futility. Having said that, I doubt whether that will work in an Asian context.
I wish there was light, but I know there isn’t. And all the candles in the world won’t change that. Still, hope springs eternal, right?
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 14/11/2015, 8:03 PMI am sorry that you have lost loved ones to tragic events. There is light in us, which makes the candles symbolic. Even though it doesn’t feel that way right now, we hold the answers for a brighter tomorrow.
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Posted by Sabiscuit | 14/11/2015, 8:23 PMI haven’t lost anyone, yet. But I’ve had them trapped in such situations. We live and we hope, don’t we?
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 14/11/2015, 9:26 PMI’m so glad to hear it. I have not been that fortunate. I do live and hope, too.
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Posted by Sabiscuit | 14/11/2015, 9:27 PMI can imagine the loss, and I’m sorry that you have had to go through it.
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 14/11/2015, 9:42 PMWell words and prayers won’t win this war. But blood won’t win this war too. Actually the situation is pretty hopeless.
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Posted by Uday | 14/11/2015, 7:30 PMBlood won WW 2, not prayers…..
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 14/11/2015, 7:31 PMAre you saying we should wage a war then? And between the two of us, I find the #PrayForParis pretty pointless.
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Posted by Uday | 14/11/2015, 7:46 PMIf we don’t then a war will be forced upon us. I just wonder if the world has the stomach for that war anymore.
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Posted by hbhatnagar | 14/11/2015, 7:48 PM