Supporting a family that has just lost their father/husband so they don't have to worry about paying the bills. I'm not sure how anybody could have any objections to that.
Given we're in the midst of what's been called
"the worst humanitarian crisis in the history of the UN" and fundraising will play a critical role in attempts to mitigate if not address that, you could take the viewpoint that it's indicative of misplaced priorities and misplaced donations. The reality is there are other parts of the world and other people that, objectively, need that money more than his family do. Or you could simply look at it as a heartwarming gesture and acknowledge the two things aren't mutually exclusive. Both seem reasonable to me, depending on your perspective and what you value in life. There are biological and moral reasons for taking care of "your own" before taking care of others. I don't think the alternative viewpoint is particularly controversial though.
The direction this thread has taken is genuinely appalling.
@Pogue Mahone the article you posted is absolutely spot on. Its pathetic. Everyone just wants to get in their cheap shots at the other side. 5 people have died ffs.
5 people that none of us know and none of us have any real connection to. I live in London, I walked through that area the day before, I have colleagues minutes away from it. I'm not as close to it all as you are, but then I'm closer to it than 90%+ of people here. I still don't have any personal connection to the victims or the incident though.
The flipside of Pogue's article is that a significant portion of people here wouldn't have been thinking about it, never mind talking about it, because they wouldn't have heard about it. The way mass media works now means it brings people "closer" to the event than ever before, despite having no authentic connection to the area it took place in never mind the victims.
For these people to offer their condolences to the family, make a point of having a moment of silence for the dead and offer whatever other gestures you can think of, it would be so inauthentic and so impersonal that it would be even more of an indictment on society than what's happened here, in my view.
It makes sense for people with no direct connection to the incident to talk about the macro elements of it. It's highly likely that it will lead nowhere constructive, but it's got more hope of doing so than a stranger writing a personal message about another stranger they've never met, simply because it's a nice thing to do.
