Tragedy at Sivakasi

There was an explosion and fire which killed around 40 people at a firecracker factory in Tamilnadu a couple of days ago. Now this appears to be a man-made disaster linked to our desire to see a lot of fire and smoke. As kids, we were fascinated by 'bombs' during Diwali celebrations- the louder the better. They came with names like Laxmi bomb, atom bomb etc., and you were generally considered a hero if you could light one of them.

But the adult manifestation of this childhood fascination is what worries me more. Wars are what I am talking about. The Middle East, Romania, and many more examples exist of this tendency. We seem to erupt into war at the drop of a hat. Iran is perpetually on the boil, at least from a war-mongering perspective. The first question that comes to mind is naturally, shouldn't you be worrying about domestic problems and fix them, before you go out and 'conquer the world'? Secondly, if you do conquer it, what are you going to do with it? Colonial cousins have proved in the past that it is a mug's game, and that once you loot a nation's wealth, you have little use for it. Governing a difficult country is a nightmare (even your own, forget an alien one).

So what is it with our fascination for wars and closer home, to firecrackers? Kids at least have an excuse..that they are yet to grow up.