Over the last several months, I’ve thought about this clip (below) from a Doctor Who episode a lot.

I’ve hesitated to post it though, because it feels a bit insensitive to the on-the-ground nuances of violence. And it probably is insensitive, insofar as it’s coming from the coziness of a safe, intact living room.

But, the stakes of war and broken families are too high to suffer cowardice. And those of us living in nations that both create and enable that violence can’t be silent.

I’m not saying we all need to make semi-melodramatic blog posts about it, but we have to invite in the discomfort of others’ suffering more deeply and more often than is afforded by the average, clinical, two-minute segment airing on the news or in a podcast feed.

Disgustingly, nothing I’ve said singles out any conflict in particular. It could be any of several. It could be them all.

Sometimes violence is unavoidable. And that fucking sucks.

But when rubble and shattered limbs settle, the only thing left accompanying the grief is to sit down and talk.

As our global collective conscience grows, hopefully we can shift more of that conversation forward, to before the shells fall.