Plunge: diving in or sinking down?
Building back up
The Falling Man is an instantly recognisable photograph; taken by Richard Drew at 9:41am on the 11th of September 2001, the image depicts a man falling from the North Tower of the World Trade Center after two planes, piloted by members of al-Qaeda, targeted New York City. 2,996 people were killed by terrorists during these attacks, and over 6,000 others were injured, to say nothing of the deep and seemingly unending fear it embedded into Western society.
In the early hours of Wednesday 14th of June, Mahad Egal witnessed a father throw two of his children from the window of his flat in Grenfell Tower in Kensington, as the building was engulfed in flames. As further eye-witness reports come in describing scenes of terrified residents throwing themselves and their family members from the building to try and avoid burning or suffocating inside, the same chill runs down my spine as when I look back at The Falling Man.
Lily Allen was this week conveniently pulled from appearing on Newsnight, after her comments about the fire on Channel 4 News caused controversy. “I have never in my entire life seen an event like this where the death count has been downplayed by the mainstream media,” she said. “Seventeen? I’m sorry but I’m hearing from people that the figure is much closer to 150, and that many of those people are children.”
Allen is not alone in maintaining this belief; protests outside the council buildings in Chelsea and Kensington demanding an explanation are reflective of the anger felt by local residents. This anger is fueled partly by misrepresentative reporting, but incubated more prominently by the injustice experienced by all the residents of Grenfell Tower.
The block was recently ‘regenerated’, with a budget of around £8 million. Phillip Hammond, Chancellor of the Exchequer, revealed to Andrew Marr that as well as being banned in Europe and the US, the plastic cladding used to cover the outside of the building, added during this regeneration, was prohibited for commercial use in the UK. To fireproof the cladding would have cost £5,000. The British Sprinkler Association estimated that fitting sprinkler systems throughout the building would have added only 2 per cent to the overall cost.
The fire in Grenfell Tower was a seemingly inevitable by-product of the conflict between an age of austerity and those who have bought into London’s property bubble. Social housing has been neglected — redecorated for the benefit of those tasked merely with observing it, and structurally ignored, at great cost to the residents.
In the wake of the terrorist attacks that have taken place on British soil throughout the last three months, the loss of life and symbolic significance of the Grenfell Tower fire have been somewhat underplayed. For those who do not rely on social housing, fear has not been a consequence of the week’s events; The Falling Man seemingly more unsettling than the plea of Tamzin and Malek Belkadi (aged 6 and 8 respectively), who were orphaned by the fire.
The Grenfell Tower fire may not be comparable to acts of international terrorism, but it surprises and concerns me that we are not scared by it. Our government has been complicit in the deaths of dozens of innocent men, women, and children; and, moreover, our culture — of gentrification and misplaced morality — afforded them such an opportunity.
I am haunted by the all too familiar feeling of waking up to terrible news updates, from home and from abroad. It is up to us to decide where we go from here; we can harbour fear, or we can work to understand it, and try to overcome it. Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, spoke of the “depths of sorrow” felt by those affected by the fire, but also of the “overwhelming depth of community” demonstrated by their response. There is hope, perhaps, that in this uncertain and uneasy time — when it feels more like we are sinking under than diving in — that things will be okay.
Originally published at www.varsity.co.uk.
