Why must we compare?

I get annoyed at pigeon holing. Why must we categorise? I guess it helps our tiny brains to comprehend things. Sometimes labels are helpful, but often not.

Why must we decide whether or not this latest disaster in Australia is "the worst ever"? I mean, does it matter? Probably it is a comfort to those going through the trauma, but really. Is it something we need to debate? The disaster is bad, very bad. Some statistics can help:

A local government official said even with an organised approach, restoring the state's infrastructure would take a couple of years because some of it had been wiped out...the biggest damage will be to the state's roads, with between 70,000km to 90,000km of council roads damaged by floods.

That's a lot of roads and a long time. When you put money in the picture it is big too - billions of dollars they are saying.

So, while it hasn't cost many lives (though every life is precious and to focus only on numbers is also heartless), it is an expensive disaster. I particularly think of the many who were struggling to pay their mortgages before this. What now? No assets and huge debt. How will the Banks react - with compassion? 


And just the trauma of it. Witness a disaster like this is emotionally traumatic - even at a distance. Imagine the man who waited for rescue on the roof of his house for 12 hours and watched bodies float by and wondered if he'd be next. Or the little boy who saw his big brother dragged away by the current.


But is it truly possible to compare it with the impact of a 20 year drought, for example? Or the disasters where many more lives have been lost? Is it possible to say that this is worse than a disaster that hit a small town and totally devastated the lives of those people, but didn't touch  more politically important or logistically important large towns? Is it even possible to say that this is better or worse than the flood which occurred in '74, based on the height of the river, when so much more development has happened in the region?


I don't know the answer. 

It isn't too often that I have a rave on this blog. I guess today is just the day. Maybe I could psychoanalyse myself and talk about the stages of grief - denial, anger etc.?

Time to get on with doing something else productive.