echo 2015 was also a year in which we repeatedly heard of attacks on various cities and countries; Paris, Palestine and not to mention the ongoing crisis of Syrian refugees. With the arrival of 2016, we can only hope that this year will bring about more of what we could only wish for – world peace.
Once again, we had our writers give their thoughts on this issue, be it what they hope for or what they have to say to the victims, et cetera.
When we talk about the recent horrifying attacks in Paris, the word “Muslim” somehow always pops out. When some people see a Muslim, they will automatically have a certain mindset about this person that they don’t know, and even go to the extent of not-so-subtly steering away from them or worse still, harassing the person. This is a sad and appalling truth about our society right now. This is most probably due to the terrorist movement ISIS who misuse the name of Allah in their outrageous attacks on the innocent. In my humble opinion, terrorism has no religion. It is extremely untrue and unfair to label someone’s religion just because someone else has misused the name of it. If you absolutely have to, you should judge people for no reason but their deeds, regardless of their creed and colour. So when you see a Muslim friend out there, please be nice and don’t be judgmental! 🙂
By: Merissa Tan Li Ying
“War, war has never changed”-Fallout 4.
War brings hatred and sadness, and vengeful intentions follow, whereby more wars would then happen. Wars bring nothing but death and hatred to everyone and more importantly, it solves nothing. Can you imagine how much better the world would be without wars? Perhaps wars could be replaced with boundaries and some form of restraints. Countries with better war capabilities might have to constantly look out for resources to sustain the country, but what if the world unites as one, without any religions to set us apart from each other and instead only one doctrine in which everyone on earth can follow? Could we evade the unnecessary warfare and deaths? It is truly saddening to watch how countries like France can fall as victims under Islamic States Militants (ISIS)’s attacks. After all, it is due to the attacks that more refugees are brought about and muslims and Islams are getting more and more generalized as the ones that bring chaos and warfare to the world. Is this sort of generalization necessary or in any ways beneficial to the world? No, I don’t think so.
By: Christopher Liew
It’s sad, and terrifying to see how the world has become over the years. Wars and attacks have always been happening for different reasons – but they always say it’s for the sake of peace. Has all these things truly brought us peace? I say it brings out the opposite. Every day these people wake up in fear of what will happen tomorrow. Lives of both wrong and innocent are taken away, for whose sake? Has any of this brought betterment for the world, or for anyone at all? Does war bring peace, or is it the reason to no peace?
By: Elycia Lee
The recent attacks have shed light on one important issue that has plagued the human race since the dawn of time. It was the cause of the World Wars, it was written all over our textbooks and moral studies telling us exactly what not to do, it is preached in religion. One word: Miscommunication. We are too caught up being “morally right” or “doing it in the name of religion” but sometimes, we have to push all these thoughts aside and just use our most basic common sense to solve the problem. Does killing thousands of innocent people help solve any problems? Doing so in the name of religion, does it make a wrong thing right? Some might argue that humans’ “common sense” is the fatal cause of all these tragedies. This might be true but what about the other millions of people out there? This is evident when world leaders, global activists or even Facebook users condemn and criticise the unruly actions of other “leaders”. Common sense is not dead nor misplaced. The one effective way of solving these problems is to use common sense and work in tandem together, communicating effectively and peacefully to come to an agreement and not just costing millions of innocent lives.
By: June Ong
When I see attacks, it does not only relate to terrorist attacks, it also means that another nation is stepping onto foreign soil to attack as well. Be it right or wrong, attacking someone or another party never brings anything good. Nobody would just sit back and take it just like that. A retaliation will sure to be invoked when one is pushed too far with something offensive. Unfortunately, the attacks on Paris going from suicide bombers to heavily armed gunmen were too inhumane to even call attacks at this stage. It is no doubt a devastating loss to a country when the lives of about 120 civilians were loss just like that but the retaliation to that attack was also not rational. Just like the saying “you must fight fire with fire” goes, it is also not right to rain down bombs on a civilian populated town as a retaliation just because there are terrorist militants residing within the area. At the end of the day, only pain, loss and agony will be felt on both sides. That is what war brings.
By: Shern
The atrocities that are happening throughout the world today are nowhere nearly as grave as the ones that happened just a few decades ago. Despite this fact, our world seems to be on a higher alert than it ever was. We watch the Paris attacks, the Beirut bombings and the Israel Palestinian war on the news, and somehow our brains get rewired into thinking, “that could have been me!” This is can all be attributed to the fact that the world is more interconnected than ever before. Twitter and facebook allow victims to share their horific stories with the world. This news is propagated like wildfire throughout the digital world which connects 80% of all humans on this planet. All of a sudden, we are being bombared with images and texts about something that society pressures us into knowing about. I am not suggesting you should turn a blind eye to our fellow human beings who are suffering but I would like to acknowledge the fact that you are safe, no matter who you are and no matter where you are.
By: Clinton Wee Yuan
Much has happened in the year 2015, hasn’t it? Unfortunately, many of the incidents were far from positive. The attacks which occurred in various parts of the world, such as in Paris and Palestine have cast a dark blight over the world. However, instead of coming together to solve this ‘epidemic’, we find ourselves pointing finger to one another and blaming each other for the tragedy that has befallen the world. In light of these, I often find myself thinking ‘why?’. We’re all children of Mother Earth, yet, why are we letting such pretences of religion and nationality divide us? If only we allowed our eyes to see beyond these ‘barriers’, we would see for ourselves that we are not as different from one another as we had initially thought. Ultimately, it is only by casting aside these inhibitions and working hand in hand to resolve the matters at hand, that we will be able to fix the global problems which threaten the peace of the world and humanity itself.
By: Tiffany Hoo
Let me tell you the way some people on the internet blame government, muslim communities and terrorists organisations about bomb explosions make you think they’re potential candidates for a presidential election. But how many of us really feel for the people in these attacks? most of us are just looking for a good argument or to join the’fun’ and hype that everybody is talking about. The thing is people get carried away and ITS NOT OKAY to blame people when you have no substantial proof. It’s not okay to discriminate the Muslims and branding everyone in their community a terrorists. It’s wrong, unethical and plain inconsiderate. Just because a small number of Muslims are terrorists, it does not mean that most of them are. Statistically speaking, there are more than 1.6 billion Muslims around the world and if they are mostly terrorists, what would that make us? Dead. So stop accusing an innocent community for all the terrible things that happen to us because just like the rest of us they endure the consequences of an attack. People are already struggling to get back on their feet without discrimination. How do you think millions of Muslim people are going to get back on their feet with half the world trying to shun them?
By: Haritha
