Why aren’t we ‘all Kenyans’?

kenya

Evans Wadongo asks a pertinent question.

Where was the sustained international outrage over radical Islamic attacks on victims in the east African nation of Kenya?

Indeed, the response to the Paris attack that killed 130 victims and injured many more should have occurred when terrorists killed Kenyans in two attacks earlier.

Yet it didn’t happen, Wadongo — a native of Kenya — has asserted.

I’ll be candid and admit that I am one of perhaps billions of people who did not react as strongly to the Kenya carnage as I did to the Paris tragedy.

Sixty-seven people died in a 2013 attack at Westgate Mall in Nairobi; in April of the year, 147 people died at Garrissa University College. The perps in both attacks were murderous jihadists.

I heard it said the other day that the response to the Paris attacks has been more visceral because millions of peopleĀ  either “have been to Paris or want to go there.” They feel a certain kinship with the City of Light, it was said. Thus, their reaction to the Paris attack hits people closer to where they live, so to speak.

I don’t know what the answer really is.

Kenyans are hurting, too.

Wadongo, who runs a non-profit relief agency, stops short of suggesting race plays a majorĀ role in the world’s different reaction. He said it’s more a lack of understanding. He said: “It’s just that people are so used to negative things coming out of certain parts of the world ā€” of Africa, of Asia, of South America. It’s the norm. People expect bad things to happen. When something bad happens in Europe or the U.S., it’s unusual. If something bad happens in some other part of the world, it’s usual.”

Whatever the case, the world needs to react as angrily to these attacks wherever they occur … and not just in these romantic locations where we don’t expect them.