As a person who often carry a backpack in public transportation or a luggage in airports it is my duty to condemn with the strongest words those who carried attacks in Brussels today, and to remind you we are not all like that.
… Sounds ridiculous ? Well, don’t ask Muslims or Arabs or anyone to do that.
– Timothée

J’ai toujours aimé “L’Union fait la force”, pied-de-nez un peu absurde à la réalité d’un pays désuni. Mais ce n’est qu’aujourd’hui que j’en perçois vraiment la portée. Il y a dans cette devise nationale pas seulement un trait d’humour narquois, mais aussi une injonction fondamentale, un rappel que notre identité, à nous qui n’en avons pas, c’est précisément d’être ensemble, forts, même face au néant. “L’Union fait la force” nous dit qu’appartenir à ce pays c’est avant toute chose d’être là avec et pour les autres. Et elle nous annonce ainsi, avec presque deux siècles d’avance, qu’il n’y a pas de place pour l’islamophobie en Belgique.
– Caroline

Today Brussels is in pain. A city that is my home and a city that I love. We are frightened and confused. A terrorist attack has hit another European capital, just as attacks inspired by an extreme misinterpretation of Islam struck London, Paris, Madrid…just as attacks have flashed and crackled across our continent and our world in the past decades – inspired by separatism, nationalism, leftist extremism and fascism, inflamed by exclusion and division. Today is a day for sadness, for holding our breath and holding each other. Tomorrow is a a day for asking why and hoping never again.
Unfortunately, the vilest segments of the British right (UKIP, Telegraph columists, etc) have already jumped on today’s events, on today’s corpses, to peddle their tired call for European disintegration. We are stronger together, as Belgians and as British, as christian, as atheist and as muslim, as Europeans.
The UK is not in Schengen. Its borders are not “open”. Yet Britain has also experienced terrible terrorist attacks, despite its “closed” borders. European cooperation and solidarity are vital to keep us as safe as we can possibly be. Brussels’ agony is no reason for Brexit. Now shut up and be sad with us.
Can’t believe we are having to say this today.
– Bryn

I hadn’t cried all day, and now it transpires I am a sucker for the kitsch of violent nationalist symbols after all, because I have just seen a picture of the Belgian flag projected onto the Eiffel Tower and started crying. And then Bryn pointed out that they’ve got it the wrong way round, and so what’s on the tower has more in common with Germany. And now I feel much better. Fuck, this has been a terrible and strange day.
– Catherine

That moment where sadness and mourning is starting to be replaced by anger, an anger for change and action. Not one filled with hate, but instead one that strives to bring people together, to wake people up out of their long sleep of media-indulged misconceptions, to share my own thoughts and experiences. Yesterday, to me, was a moment to realise that you can’t just sit down and watch it happen, because then the wrong people will take over. I’m a proud Brusseleir, but my identity is much more than that. I’m Brusseleir, Antwerpenaar, Tunisian, Belgian, European, Arab, Muslim, woman, queer and happy to be alive. I feel as much at home meditating in a mosque as I feel being in a packed bar drinking the best Belgian beers with friends and new faces. And no one is going to tell me I can’t. ‪#‎jesuissickofthisshit‬
– Sara