Crushing grief will alter us

What can anyone say in the wake of the horror shootings that have shattered New Zealanders’ sense of security forever?

We’ve changed.

Before, I used to think of this as the last safe place on Earth. There was even a part of me that thought we as a people were somehow better than those other places where hate crimes happen.

I know there are people who are bigoted and racist — I work in talkback, for heaven’s sake. But I never thought for one wild second that there would be individuals who would put inchoate thought into action. Such cowardly action.

To shoot at people in a place of worship, kneeling in prayer, unarmed and with their backs turned. How despicably craven.

Before, I was desperate for my daughter and son-in-law and grandchildren to leave London and come home, to a safe place.

After, I rang them on Friday night and told them they might as well stay in the UK. Nowhere’s safe. And it’s grasping at straws to say the main shooter was an Australian national. There are like minds and sympathisers here. That’s why I can’t get on board with #thisisnotus on social media.

I know we’d all like to think #thisisnotus. But we have to own there are people in NZ who are so filled with hate, they are willing to aid and abet terrorists.

And I can’t yet respond to the calls to use this atrocity to band together, to show the vile haters amongst us that we will not be bowed by their actions. Not yet.

Right now, I’m still trying to absorb the sheer numbers who have been murdered and whose families are reeling from their loss.

There will be things we can do — already the Prime Minister has said our gun laws will change. But right now, the pain is too raw to feel anything but crushing grief.