Another take on the Boston bombing

We tend to forget that many posters are hs or college boys who are stuck by their own insecurities so trash all about them who are not part of the tribe. We see that with the ridicule of the charity folks, those whose runs and probably families were directly affected by the bombs. These are the nicest peoples among us. They have a dream to run Boston so raise money for kids with cancer and other conditions yet are scorned. Their lives have found them less mono-focused than maybe you and I but why should I care. I am racing the clock, not them. The thing about Boston is the community feeling, the party, the individual pursuit from a variety of motivations.

I chose to ignore and rarely fight back when some kid slams me. I am interested in the running and racing and the appreciation of those that share those interests.

Nice post by you. It'll take a while for all of us to reconcile yesterday. Thanks.

Good post. I hope people take it to heart.

We always hope that with age and experience comes perspective.

Unfortunately, I know many "adults" who don't get there.

The forum is a wonderful place to be snarky and to play to sides of our personalities that we are expected to keep under wraps. It is, just as the marathoning, road-racing, and trail running communities are to their memberships, our own little dysfunctional haven.

Where the other groups have an advantage (most of the time) is that we celebrate the diversity of personality and goals, whereas this group, including many whose opinions I respect, play up a mean-spirited, intolerant side.

I appreciate your comments.

Setting aside the trolls on this board that are simply the price we pay for a public message board, I disagree that LR posters don't get it. There is a fair critique that the marathon "experience" movement has taken some of the sport out of the marathon and turned it into a participatory event just to benefit certain organizers and charity groups (Competitor, TnT). Some do unfairly hate on these groups and organizations, but many simply point out that the benefits gained through mass participation in the marathon should also translate into better prize money, elite athlete support etc.

Precious Roy:

You are one whose posts I typically look forward to. Your comment on this thread is representative of what I wish we could have for a couple of days: discussions/disagreements of a higher order.

For me, it is not a matter of taking the sport out of the marathon. I too, want the elite to profit, financially, as well as, in status/recognition, from the attention/participation of the masses.

At its best, this forum is father/coach to the young runner, admirer of the long-timers (crap, the old marathoner's name is evading me at the moment), kind ear for the discouraged. That's community at its best.

In some ways, the general population runners celebrate community better than we do. Yeah, I shake my head at the color runs, forty-two minute 5K crowd (although, now that I think of it, 42 is the answer) for just a second, I quickly get back to the smiles on their faces, the sense of accomplishment they seem to project.

When I watch a race (my competitive days are gone)I make sure to stick around for the back of the pack crowd. They appreciate the applause/encouragement as much as the fast ones.

I guess threads like this and posters like you are meant to serve as, for the lack of a better term, models for the youngsters who haven't figured out that trolling doesn't have to be mean-spirited or condescending.

Having worked with young people for many years, I know it won't sink in for some time, but I do believe it is a message they must be continually exposed to.

Maybe I just want to see the quality lurkers come out for a moment and spread something positive.

Thanks.

I think most runners do understand community, even the ones who read and post on this forum. I think it's just the anonymity of this public forum that ends up displaying some of the worst sides of people.

Sorry, but there are too many on here that only live to cause pain, wheter it be with bombs or internet posts.

the clarifier wrote:

However, without fail, these hosts, who rarely care about or understand running, have figured out something the LR community, in practice, has not figured out.

Road racing is about community, about celebrating the accomplishments of competitors, family, and friends. It is one place where social and political barriers lack relevance.

If these guys get it, why don't we?

Huh!?! This is the reason we run and they don't. This is the main reason I compete. Sure, it's cool to run PRs and what not, but why show up to a road race for anything other than to interact with other runners that share a common interest?

All-of-a-sudden every sports show host is an expert on everything running?

the clarifier wrote:

Road racing is about community, about celebrating the accomplishments of competitors, family, and friends. It is one place where social and political barriers lack relevance.

Yeah, and football is about community, about watching games with family and friends, celebrating the accomplishments of the players and so on.

Well, not for those who actually play football.

oiupoiu wrote:

All-of-a-sudden every sports show host is an expert on everything running?

Not at all.

They cater to audience and ratings. I just appreciate that they are willing to spend some time recognizing the magnitude of what happened and are trying to relate to it at the best level they can.

In that simplicity, they have hit on your key. It is about more than just competition.

What has also happened, is that some of these hosts have broken character and showed who they really are, not who they play on radio.

Thanks for taking part in this discussion.

runners vs spectators wrote:

Well, not for those who actually play football.

Might disagree with you there. Many retired athletes in the team sports indicate that they most miss the interaction with teammates and opponents.

I suspect that, in honest moments, they would also admit missing the attention from the fans.

I am not sure that the comparison between running and the sports you mention works, but I am glad you brought it into play.

Thanks for being part of this conversation.

I think the thing is our sport exists on two planes. It's a cut throat competitive race AND a sport open to those just checking something off their bucket list.

hence the friction.

You say the running community is the most important. Still you want to temporarily change letsrun into something it's not and has never been.

The letsrun community is not about being over polite and say thank you to every poster for his/her latest post. Letrun is about tough discussions, joking, trolling, etc.

You're giving in to the terrorists.

Well said, OP. We're all hurt by what happened yesterday, and once the dust settles a little bit, the finger pointing(rightfully) starts. While we may be tempted to accuse those blaming Muslim groups for the bombings as misinformed, right-winged trolls, I think it's important to remember that what happened in Boston is the kind of stuff that pulls some very raw emotion out of people, and we tend to speak without thinking.

With that said, this is not an attempt to justify some of the irreverent posts on here, but rather to ask everyone to respect the opinions of well-intentioned posters, even if they are not comparable to your own.

posted this on facebook and thought that i would put it here as well. I called into my local talk radio sports station yesterday, and the host was put off that i wanted to talk about this in terms of what would happen next year, and the year after that. What i meant was this:

The terrorist attack upon Boston, using the institution of the Boston Marathon as the opportunity to hurt and kill and instill fear, is utterly reprehensible. The world community, the sane world community, will condemn this in words, and the individuals or group of individuals, whether they execute another plan like this or not, will have likely achieved some of their goals. Making people think twice about attending large open sporting events, events that aren’t constantly policed at every entrance and exit, instilling that kernel of fear into a million brains at once, that’s one of their goals.

And its worth repeating, since we’ve gotten so used to the word “terrorist” that we often forget to look at the root, terror, which is defined at “intense, sharp, overmastering fear.” Fear of what? Fear of boarding an airplane? Fear of getting on a subway platform? Fear of running a marathon? Fear of living your life? The answer is: all of the above. The terrorist is looking to take away that which you hold dear, for whatever perceived slight or abuse they have had to suffer.

And that revenge includes killing 8 year olds.

The running community has long been a hearty lot, and we react, irrationally, compulsively, to many things, but the overriding aspect is that we keep on going. We run in warzones, we run in inhospitable weather, we run through tragedies. And our community, if you pressed us, to a person, would most likely be to say that we love the freedom we have when we run. Any type of freedom of course, freedom from the job, from the kids, from the cell phone, freedom to run hard, to float, to pass as many others before the finish line. The freedom to enjoy whatever freedom we like. Running the marathon, a bucket list right of passage for so many, with the goal of qualifying for Boston, has been there for, literally, millions of runners the world over. But an event like this wants to cow us, and take that freedom away from us.

But we are stronger than that. We deplore the senseless killings of innocents for a goal, any goal, and we will show that we are stronger than you. That our love of that freedom, that our love of something as silly as putting one foot in front of the other is so important to us that it is likely buried in our DNA, that we will not be stopped. That the marathon will not end, that we will not change our lives in fear of terror.

These terrorists, whoever they are, will have gained nothing. Right now, there are dead to bury, and bodies to sew up and heal, and both mourning and a steeling of our spines to not give in to fear. The terrorists have showed us, like many other ways we are tested in this century, how strong we will have to be. The Boston has continued for over 100 years, from before the motor car into the atomic age and, now, into the age of domestic war. And we will continue to run, for as many reasons out there as steps taken, but mostly, likely, for those freedoms. We will run to be free.

don't give in wrote:

You say the running community is the most important. Still you want to temporarily change letsrun into something it's not and has never been.

The letsrun community is not about being over polite and say thank you to every poster for his/her latest post. Letrun is about tough discussions, joking, trolling, etc.

You're giving in to the terrorists.

Sorry for the short answer. Had to run off to work.

Don't know how long you have been visiting LR Forum. I am have not been here since the beginning. I have been around long enough to know that there was a time when there was significant input from the elite community.

Since I have been here, there have been several significant posters who no longer contribute. Hell, Malmo is as present as he used to be.

I am not a pollyanna. I know what this place is and what it isn't. That won't stop me from striving to make it a better place.

That would be giving in to you.

Thanks again.

Let me make something very clear. Any life lost is important to me and should be important to all people. Attacks like this are done for different reasons. Many who have done this in the past have been shown to have severe mental issues. At the same time, most people with mental issues would never even think of doing something like this and are non-violent in nature.

I see the huge coverage in America and it seems to me that when a tragedy like this occurs in America, the world is much more aware - especially much more aware and angry than if it occurs in a Third World country. Should we care less when innocent people are killed in Afghanistan or Mozambique?

Do we care less or is it just easier to ignore the fact that 20,000+ kids per day in the world die from lack of clean drinking water or starvation? Martin Richard's death (the 8 year old boy) is a tragedy and it is getting a lot of press, but is his death going to teach us to spend millions more in security at events in First World countries or can it teach us instead to start trying to help the 20,000+ kids like Martin who are living in extreme poverty and dieing of dysentery daily?

We don't hear the stories of the kids dieing every day, but if we did, we would feel as bad as we do for Martin.

If we only care about First World people, the thing to do is spend more on extra security to try to make sure these things (like Boston) don't happen as often. We may save a hundred Martins a year by doing this. But the easiest way to save more is to solve the inequities in the world and save millions of Martins. It isn't hard to do.

We have the money and the knowledge to do the latter, but do we have the will?

Logical:

I don't have any disagreement with the concern that we ignore problems around the world and that news coverage in the United States overdoes it.

The question you raise is far more worthy of discussion than the multiple fingerpointing and hate-filled posts generated by the bombing.

'They have a dream to run Boston so raise money for kids with cancer and other conditions yet are scorned. '

Once, but it will be on facebook forever