How does our culture affect how we respond to and recover from carnage and collective trauma?
I was in Oslo during the conclusion of the wrenching 10-week trial of Anders Behring Breivik, the confessed killer in Norway's worst violence since World War II.
On July 22, 2011, Breivik exploded a bomb in Oslo's government district, killing eight. He then methodically murdered 69, mostly teenagers, at the Labor Party's annual summer camp on the nearby tiny island of Utoya.
Just before I left Norway, a gunman opened fire at a party near Auburn University in Montgomery, Ala., killing three, including two Auburn football players.
We Americans are all-too-familiar with violence — like the massacre in an Aurora, Colo., movie theater where James Holmes is accused of killing 12 and wounding 58.
USA Today's Chuck Raasch tells us that Jessica Ghawi, one of the Aurora victims, had narrowly escaped Toronto's June 2 deadly shopping mall rampage. The question she posted afterward on her blog is one we all ask: "Is this the world we live in?"
With attacks in shopping malls, theaters, schools, churches, and campgrounds, is there safe harbor anywhere — even in peaceful Norway?
To rephrase the title of the film that the Aurora victims were about to view, "The Dark Night Is Already Here."
While all this resurrects debate over firearms and ramping up security in public places, how will our responses to these senseless tragedies reflect our sociocultural values?
When Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg responded to the attacks — "the answer to violence is even more democracy, even more humanity," he said — the public's unified and compassionate demonstration of his comment reveals its own deep-rooted values.
I learned more about them after meeting leading figures involved in the aftermath of Norway's calamity. Here are some glimpses.
Are Holen, psychiatrist and professor at Trondheim's Norwegian University of Science and Technology and a key witness in the trial, tells me that Norwegians are historically bound in trust, equality, and solidarity.
So the attack is especially traumatic. Upon examining Breivik, Holen remains convinced that the killer is certifiably insane, suffering from psychotic paranoid schizophrenia. He's a loner who, probably like Holmes, inhabits his own concocted universe.
Breivik will be found guilty. If he's guilty on insanity grounds — for him, the supreme insult, puncturing his delusions —he'll undergo treatment in a secured psychiatric facility.
If he's guilty on criminal grounds, the preference of outspoken political voices, his sentence will be extended beyond Norway's maximum 21 years if he's deemed to still be a danger to society.
Either way, given his avowal to kill again, Breivik will be locked up indefinitely.
Rather than focus on Breivik and his twisted manifesto condemning multiculturalism, especially "Islamization," let's instead consider Norway's culture and people. It is precisely Norway's tradition of openness and equality that lends itself to embrace cultural diversity while undergoing meaningful social transition in the process. Norway's long-standing culture will shape response and recovery.
Holen believes that trust and equality still remain. This was palpable throughout my visit, as I observed people of all ages and different cultures — Pakistani, Africans, etc. — quietly sharing company in parks and cafes. Like the young Asian mother who sat beside me on a park bench with her baby, reading her Norwegian book.
Meeting Red Cross director Anne Cecilie Fossum and the National Support Group for victims' families vice chair, Christin Bjellard, at a cafe outside the courthouse reinforced my impressions. Anne Cecilie facilitates discussions between victims' families and support groups. Christin, whose son at the camp survived the massacre, is one of families' three spokespersons during the emotionally draining trials as the court heard the case for each victim.
They described how a husband whose wife died in the Oslo bombing fervently appealed the court to not allow this event to turn Norway into a heavy security-centered state, as Holen said earlier, to preserve Norway's "innocence" even in this "loss of innocence."
When Norway's king waits in line to go skiing in public without a cavalcade of security, this speaks volumes about trust. And when an angry Iraqi father whose son was killed on Utoya threw his shoe at Breivik during proceedings, rather than react disapprovingly, everyone softly applauded to show support and understanding. Empathy in the flesh.
My conversation with lawyer Alexandra Bech Gjorv near Oslo's bombed government buildings confirmed this power of solidarity. Alexandra leads the July 22 Commission charged with examining future security and recovery measures and writing the final official report of the tragedy. Astute, articulate and attentive, she embodies the public ethos with her measured disposition and fair-mindedness, making her a fitting leader of the commission, a balanced mix of professionals and citizen representatives and, crucially, independent of government. This affirms equality in a social democracy prioritizing the common good over private and political interests.
Regarding culture, here's the big question. Our own established values of individual freedom preclude banning weapons. So, what other values will enable us to feel safe in an armed society?
For Norwegians, imbedded values of trust and solidarity will win out. Norway's grace will triumph over her loss.
To get a sense of Norwegian culture, University of Northern Iowa social work professor Katherine van Wormer suggests viewing Michael Moore's clip at http://tinyurl.com/4dvdwo
I prefer to meet Norwegians face-to-face on their own ground. My experience so far has discovered a people with genuine kindness, trust and openness. I shall return.
Michael Brannigan is the Pfaff Endowed Chair in Ethics and Moral Values at The College of Saint Rose. His email address is michael.brannigan@strose.edu.