grief of the parents and community - and feeling that it could have happened anywhere.
Anger and fear are under. standable responses to many of the desperate situations people find themselves in as life decays almost visibly around them.
Disintegration in the very fabric of society partly results from government policies, but it is also the consequence of a deeper crisis of the system in which we live.
That system, based on the heartless profit motive, not only doles out economic disaster to the poorest as benefits are cut and homelessness rises, as hospitals close and schools fall apart but dishes up personal human misery to people, often regardless of their economic position.
That sense of alienation is experienced differently by different peo. ple and produces different responses.
But hard as it may be to accept, many of those who carry out dreadful acts of violence are themselves Victims.
Feelings of powerlessness and despair which result from personal loss are not the right places from which to make a response.
The laws for which the parents of Dunblane have campaigned would not have prevented the tragedy. Thomas Hamilton, like others who have committed similarly ghastly massacres, killed himself at the end of the slaughter.
Finding and using an illegal weapon would not have been a barrier.
Both Tory and Labour politicians have been quick to jump on the moral bandwagon with a series of new menures.
Calls for teaching of 'civics' from those involved in layer upon layer of sleaze don't ring true.
The introduction of the national curriculum and other recent education reforms has made it harder for teachers to discuss issues with young people in ways that are rele. vant to their lives. Howard's pro. posals for mandatory sentencing and crime checks on Job Seekers must be vigorously opposed.
This will load to more cases of in. nocent people being punished for things they did not do - as if there were not enough miscarriages of justice already.
More prisons and harsher sentences have not made people's lives or streets safer - why should we think it will work this time.
On the contrary, there is much more evidence that it is steps such as properly resourced rehabilitation which begin to tackle real social problems.
It is vital that trade unions and labour parties take up the debate on these issues and begin to break through what is being presented as a consensus by all but the judiciary on these vital issues.
The situation that led to the recent massive mobilisations in Belgium recently where in many ways specific to that country and those particular circumstances.
But they do provide an example that it is possible to turn fear and anger into powerful solidarity, that it is not inevitable that from bitter loss will come reactionary social demands.