Bin Laden's Death and Ethics

This past weekend was the weekend that was: Friday, Saturday, Sunday. From pure innocent joy to the murky ethics of war. On Friday, the whole world rejoiced with the beautiful bride and handsome groom, the pageantry, the Bank Holiday for Britons, the soaring cathedral music, the two kisses. We needed a chance to celebrate, to party on.

Saturday in Oakland we basked in the warmer spring weather, the sunshine, the flowers. I saw more people strolling and window shopping on the streets than I'd seen in many weeks. Ah, the Bay Area Weather! "It's worth facing the high unemployment after all, if just for today."

Sunday was May Day, also the historical code words for "Help! Disaster," shouted on the radio in the old black and white movies by midshipmen from their leaking cubbyholes below decks. May 1st also used to feature Morris dancers with satin ribbons whirling around a Maypole. And I can't forget that May Day used to be a time for the Workers to reflect or even to organize for The Revolution.

Then Sunday night. The President makes a special announcement: Osama Bin Laden has been killed during an "action" in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Huh? I've almost forgotten about this bearded mythical media-ogre, rumored to be hiding in caves in between speeches on TV. Then the television and computer screens go berserk. The wedding parades are suddenly superseded by jubilant processions of victory dancers outside the White House, in Times Square, strangely similar to celbration after the final game of the World Series, or World Cup Soccer.

Wait a minute. We were all celebrating the Royal Wedding, examining the Dress, day dreaming about who Harry will marry. Now we're jumping up and down because someone is dead? We shot the enemy in the head and threw the body into the Arabian Ocean. Full stop. Yay hurray? Flashback: did Arab crowds cheer the exploding Twin Towers? I can't remember. Possibly, even probably. There's something chilling, something familiar, about this joyful vengeance, high five for retaliation-as-victory, the way we'd slap each other after getting a strike at the bowling alley. We explain to ourselves that killing Bin Laden was self defense, right?

But still, in my book, taking a human life is not like winning the World Series. I was brought up to believe that dancing on someone's grave was one of the worst things you could do. Perhaps Bin Laden danced on the graves of unknown numbers of Americans. Does it make it right for us to dance on Bin Laden's? Or do we then become like him?