Whom counts?

I started writing about this over year ago - time, where does it all go! Since I can not go back and really write what I had started, I'll have to do it with shadows and mist, hoping that the real message isn't lost...

Back then, there was a suicide bomber. I know, I know, it is hard to believe that we still had them only last year - it seems like an eternity since the alien invasion put an end to all of that nonsense, but hear me out anyway. The thing I considered way back in those darkened ages when we still said "ook, ook" all of the time: who mourns for the suicide bomber?

It was a small bombing, they only counted something like five dead. The question in my mind at that time, those five dead (or as they say, they found five bodies, I guess the people had already left since they were never mentioned, just their bodies), who were they? Not individually, since realistically it wouldn't matter to me unless I personally knew them. I didn't see anyone I know shedding a tear for them while chowing down at Mr. Steer that night. No, my question was more, I don't know... well, enough pussyfooting around, here is the question:

Of the five bodies, did they count the suicide bomber? I assume that said bomber's body would have been amongst those aforementioned bodies found at the scene, but did they separate him out? Did five people die that day and the bomber, or did four people and a suicider? Was the news reporter counting the suicide bomber as a person, I guess is the crux of my thoughts. Why, one might ask, well...

Is all life sacred? If so, isn't the tragic death of the person wearing the bomb just as sad as the people who were in the blast area? He died in a bomb blast just like the other people did, and none of them are complaining about who actually pulled the trigger, so why should we? Realistically, for the vast majority of people in the world, the impact of his death weighed the same in their minds as the deaths of the other people, which is pretty much: none.

Since we do not know anything about the lives of any of the people who died that day, who was really good and who was really evil (how many were going to go home that night and do something nasty and evil, but were stopped by that event? we will never know...), how can were mourn for any of them? Can you really mourn someone that you do not know?

The Edward