Scary mind games on the tube

[fluffymark]

I hate to say it, but London has changed over the last few days. All that British stuff upper lip about standing up to terrorists by drinking tea in their direction has turned out to be a short term consolement. London is now a city afraid. A city scared of the unknown. It's happened slowly, but for the past week or every tube train I've travelling on I've unwittingly been dragged into the mind game of fear. I'm sittin on tha train, and find myself *aware* of everyone around me. I look at them, and their bags. Is the bag large? Does it look strange? Is that person opposite me muslim? What's under that large padded coat? And I'm not the only one - everyone is checking out everyone else in the same way. The trains are full of nervous, scared glances everywhere. Someone gets on with a large rucksack - everyone in the carriage looks at them hard. People move away. People are afraid. It's a horrible horrible mind game. Worst affected are the asians. I see people about to sit down on empty seats, and then see that theres an asian muslim man with a large beard in the next seat, suddenly look uncomfortable, and decide they'd sit elsewhere. The asian man himself looks even more uncomfortable, all closed in and paranoid. Everyone is afraid of him. He's not a terrorist. Nor is the guy standing near me with the large jacket. But people are still afraid. Everyone's playing the scary mind game of fear. It's totally irrational. But nobody wants to lose this game by not paying attention. And becasue of this, everyone is losing. Trust is rapidly fading. The terrorists have changed us. What could possibly be more frightening than having an enemy who can't give a reason you can understand for wanting to destroy you?

Comments

[mrph.livejournal.com]

It appears to me that the ones who feel most afraid right now are the ones who are either too young to remember what it was like to live and work in London during the height of the IRA mainland campaign or simply weren't here in this country at the time

*nod* I've been thinking that myself.