IT’S NOT the first time a pilot has committed mass murder/suicide with his passengers as victims. Here are three other instances.
- LAM Flight TM-470,
Nov. 29, 2013—death toll: 33
- Egypt Air Flight 990,
Oct. 31, 1999—death toll: 217
- Silk Air Flight 185,
Dec. 19, 1997—death toll: 104
It seems everyone discussing the latest incident cannot comprehend such evil—“no reason,” “incomprehensible,” “beyond belief,”’ etc.
But there has to be a reason.
How about evil as a motive? Too nebulous?
E.O. Wilson, the famous Harvard sociobiologist, in his famous 700-page seminal work “Sociobiology: The New Synthesis,” wrote that it appears that basically there are three types of motivation that drive plants and animals: (1) altruistic; (2) selfish; and (3) spiteful.
Examples of the first kind are the blood donors, the volunteers in disaster areas, and the good samaritans who help as first responders in accidents or crimes. They constitute about 10 percent of the population.
The second are those who care mostly and primarily about themselves, their families, clans and country. They account for 85 percent of the population.
The third, comprising 5 percent of the population, are those who engage in seemingly “motiveless” actions like: throwing chewing gums onto footpaths; spitting at pedestrians from a moving vehicle; keeping roosters in a condominium; dirtying walls with graffiti of all sorts; arson; serial murders; suicide; self-mutilation; crashing planes.
Budget airlines typically keep their prices low by paying their pilots and flight
attendants less than what their counterparts in big carriers receive although they spend as much long hours in their work. A crash of a budget airline plane near Buffalo, New York, a couple of years ago was attributed to pilot fatigue. Could resentment have been a contributing factor? Only God knows.
But now that this conclusion has been reached, and the appalling evil of it all is sinking in, it might be a good idea for all concerned to examine their own conscience.
Evil is real. And sometimes it needs no reason to exist, except because of resentment and ingratitude.
May God have mercy on all the souls of the victims of the Germanwings plane crash.
—WALTER PAUL KOMARNICKI,
langka958@gmail.com