Our celebrations push back at terror

The London Marathon will go ahead Sunday, with a field of more than 36,000 runners and an estimated one million spectators.

The 10-kilometre Vancouver Sun Run is also going ahead Sunday. It attracts about 50,000 runners each year. The same day in Toronto, about 7,000 runners, including Canadian Olympic marathoner Eric Gillis, are to participate in the Yonge Street 10k. Toronto’s GoodLife Fitness Marathon on May 5 expects 14,000 runners from more than 50 countries.

These runs, and many more, will not be cancelled in the response of the twin bombs that exploded Monday near the finish line of the legendary Boston Marathon, killing three people, including an eight-year-old, and injuring more than 170 people.

London Marathon organizers are determined to show solidarity with Boston, despite the fact the British capital has long been targeted for attacks.

The fact these runs will go ahead doesn’t mean people are not frightened. They are. And they are shocked and horrified by the explosions in Boston, deeply moved and saddened by the death and injury.

But we must grasp that this type of event happens across the globe, every day. Such attacks far away don’t generally receive intensive media coverage in North America or Britain. That’s not because we don’t care about others or because we consider ourselves somehow immune to attack. It’s that we are not yet accus- tomed, as others are, to such things happening in our own back yards.

Terror’s reach is global. We should not be surprised by that, given globalized politics, economics, communication and cultural exchange. We should not assume terror attacks will not occur on our home turf.

How should we respond? Hunker down? Stay home? Cancel international events that draw millions of people together to celebrate sport — or science, or music, or poetry? If no one is there, no one will get hurt.

But that allows terror to win. And if we let that happen, we lose more than simply an opportunity to celebrate. We lose those common ties that draw us together as an engaged and interested global community.

There are six cities in the world marathon series — Boston, London, Tokyo, Berlin, Chicago and New York. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of other cities that stage marathons, including Belgrade, Serbia, which plans to go ahead with its run this weekend. And Hamilton hosts the Around the Bay Race, the oldest road race in North America.

This global community of runners symbolizes the broader global community that includes each one of us. While we must acknowledge that safety is not truly possible in our world, we also must continue to push back at terror by coming together, by supporting each other and by celebrating all that makes us human.