Comment on Kenyan violence

When I read about the violence and killing in Kenya, I feel sad and confused. How can people do this to one another? I feel the same when I read about Congo and Sierra Leone. The scale and viciousness is incomprehensible to me, a Canadian, raised to believe in the goodness of my fellow humans and hope for a better world.

What really strikes me is this: That the killing is not with rifles or bombs or anonymous landmines. This is hand-to-hand combat, stabbings and burnings and pummelling. In this case, you see the whites of your enemy’s eyes, but also smell his sweat, perhaps get your hand moistened by his tears, you feel the warmth of his body and his blood. This killing requires ruthlessness, anger and conviction. There is hatred here, true hatred.

I notice that the crowds as usual are men. Men fighting men. Men killing men. Men killing women and men killing children. I cannot say that no women are involved – perhaps there are a few mothers who’ve left their children in the care of relatives to charge out into the streets and attack their neightbours. But I somehow doubt it. The BBC reports:

…hundreds of men from Kikuyu and Luo sides are being kept apart by only a handful of police officers, who are firing live rounds into the air.

I heard a caller on World Have Your Say describe the problems of youth violence as a problem of boys, of people suffering from testosterone poisoning. Is half of Kenya suffering from bad elections or testosterone poisoning?