Time Doesn’t Heal All Wounds

Last week, members of the United States Special Forces captured Ahmed Abu Khatallah, the terror suspect believed to be responsible for the 2012 attack on U.S. personnel in Benghazi. Among the four Americans killed in the attack was Sean Smith, better known to the EVE Online community as the character Vile Rat. Nearly two years after his tragic death, I’m still having a hard time coming to terms with the circumstances.

I’m going to start this off by saying that I never knew Sean Smith in real life. I wish I had. Nor am I going to go into some in-depth eulogy, people who knew him much better than I did a better job anyways.

I knew the character Vile Rat though. He was pretty famous internally within Goonswarm when I first joined the alliance in the middle of 2007. He’d hang out in the Sigma jabber channel and I’d occasionally bullshit with him, and once in a while I’d joke around with him in comms. He helped develop a powerful internal mythology in Goonswarm along with other players like Remedial, Sesfan Qu’lah (#1 CEO of my heart), Scavok, Stoffer Ninjapirate, SUAS, The Mittani, Deaken Fiss and Zastrow. Over the years most of the older players moved on due to real life and burnout. Yet when all the oldtimers started vanishing, he and a handful of others stuck around and helped build Goonswarm into the entity it is today. Most of the crazy political events that involved Goonswarm from the RedSwarm Federation days until his death were directly attributed to him. The community response to his passing was a testament to just how profound his contributions to EVE are, and some of the kindest words spoken about him came from Goonswarm Federation’s biggest enemies.

One of the worst parts of growing up is slowly losing friends and family to death. There is sense to be made from death. People get older, people get diseases, people get in accidents, and people even commit suicide. No matter how heart-breaking it can be, there is usually some sense to be had, even in unexpected death. But time, no matter how slowly, usually heals all wounds. But nearly two years later, I’m still having trouble moving on.

Part of the problem with moving on is that the Benghazi attacks had significant national political fallout that continues to this day. I’ve always been involved following politics; I’ve been enamoured talking on the subject with like-minded individuals and respectfully debating those who disagree with mine. Yet the 2012 American election was one of the most bitter experiences of my life. Anger at an administration that failed to protect an online friend I knew and anger at a significant number of people who used a tragedy to further promote their own agenda.

I’ve been hoping the last two years that punishing those who did the attack would bring me some closure. Up until now, I’ve figured my anger would go away once those responsible are brought to justice.

So far, that hasn’t been the case.