JULY 30 — Last week’s tragedy in Oslo, where Anders Breivik shot and killed almost a hundred innocent people, will for some time be a case-study on how one of the most progressive countries in the world, Norway, ‘produced’ a murdering psychopath who hated a certain group of people (in Breivik’s case, Muslims) so much he was willing to kill his own people for being more tolerant than him.

How can we explain the emergence of a figure like Breivik? Is he reflective of Norwegian society, and if so, where did the country go wrong? Or, if Breivik was an exception, was it something ‘forced’ upon him or chosen by him and, most importantly, what can Norwegian society do to prevent the (exceptional) creation of future Breiviks?

What follows are three possible explanations:

1. This is a more or less isolated act and we can understand the tragedy entirely by examining the psyche or personality of Breivik. This would put the blame entirely in the mind of Breivik with the good news being that we should be glad that very few think — let alone act — like him. To take this route would be most unfortunate because to argue that this was a tragic fluke of personality would be, in fact, to argue that nothing can be done on a socio-political level. It’s all in Breivik’s mind.

The Malaysian corollary would be to suggest that a racist like Ibrahim Ali is in principle either a psycho or an evil person and it’s really no one else’s fault. The logical steps forward would be bring down the rain of punishment, isolation or forced silence on him and that’s that.

There is light and only this pervert was full of darkness.

2. We can look at the negative influences on Breivik’s life and emphasise how these influences run AGAINST the grain of Norwegian culture and society. This is less ‘comfortable’ than putting the sole blame on Breivik and some work would have to be done to ferret out these negative messages and deviant themes that have so tragically impacted at least one citizen’s mindset.

Malaysia-wise, this would involve questioning the subversive messages spread behind closed doors, looking at hidden messages in school textbooks, reading between the lines of various media and political parties’ communiqués and so on. This second paradigm continues to hold to a ‘true’ way for society and believes that people like Ali come about as a result of something counter to an original good.

There is still light and racism is a product or symptom of darkness.

3. Finally, the third more disturbing option, we could view Breivik’s violence as a manifestation of what was already and always there in Norwegian society. The bomb and the shootings were a sudden exposé of a dark underside; a side that was hidden yet necessary for a nation that wanted to nurture one of the most open and politically participative societies ever. This is to say that the violence witnessed last weekend is that which sustains the harmonious society witnessed for so long, i.e. Norway the calm and prosperous nation is simply the flip-side of Norway the nation of potential mass-murderers. A peaceful multi-cultural democracy, according to this view, cannot persist for long without betraying the elitism, bigotry and totalitarianism inherent to and constitutive of this same democracy.

If this were true in Malaysia, it would suggest, for example, that racism is the very desire that spurs its own condemnation. It would mean that someone like Ibrahim Ali is not only not exceptional, he possibly represents the repressed expression of those who most vigorously oppose him. It would mean that May 13 is not so much an external evil we must fight against, but an internal demon we must be identity in ourselves order to avoid loving too much.

Light and darkness are one and the same.

To acknowledge that our good society may be a facade hiding more furious elements is no simple act. The way ‘forward’ is an uncomfortable one of opening ourselves to our most shameful wants, so shameful that most have pushed it to an unknown corner of their minds.

It would require a drastic breaking, a radical self-interrogation for which no ‘solution’ is guaranteed. At the very least, though, we would be seeking to unveil self-deception at its purest i.e. that which we tell ourselves others believe about us.

Norway, if the nation is the very paragon of democratic ideals it perhaps has the right to claim it is, could only benefit from further exploring the implications of this third paradigm. Isn’t democracy itself, in one sense, about avoiding any absolute political closure, about the drive to continually question and doubt any attempt to fill up that void which is political space itself?

In a word, isn’t democracy the blood-type of a people who have decided to always search for — and thus forego the need to absolutely know — what they are about? Such a people would keep their eyes out for symptoms and signs of that which is in them which is more than them, more than they can bear.

If nothing else, isn’t the recognition that we don’t know ourselves and the malignant forces within us, this politics of non-recognition, the very essence a politics of humility and thus the force to never stop learning?

The wonder of human language is that it is a symbolic system that has ‘chopped’ the world up according to its categories. That avatar who enjoys paedophilic online conversations could very well be the kindest and most generous person in the office. Life-giving soil cannot be separated from the death-bringing magma. If we would have life, we need to understand the destruction that sustains it. And brace ourselves when it explodes.

(Oh of course, there’s always an easier way out and this is to tell ourselves I’m not so bad, I’m certainly not evil. It’s those guys... those people... their crimes, their hate. Me, I’m just normal...)

* Alwyn Lau reads The Malaysian Insider.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication. The Malaysian Insider does not endorse the view unless specified.