At the end of the second world war, as the full extent of the devastation of the Holocaust became apparent, Raphael Lemkin, a Polish Jew whose entire family had been killed, pulled himself from a grief we can barely contemplate to try to find ways to prevent the killing he had witnessed from ever happening again. This is not the first time we have stood in the face of crimes we could not name. But our knowing lacks language, lacks law, lacks a path to action.Īdelaide wildlife rescuer Simon Adamczyk carries an injured koala on Kangaroo Island, South Australia, during last summer’s devastating bushfires. We know what killed them, and we know what is threatening the lives of all of us who remain. Who killed the 3 billion animals we estimate died as a result of Australia’s devastating bushfires of 2019-20? What about the trees, the grasses, the insects, the microbes, the fungi? What about the people? What about our faith in the future? What about summertime? Their deaths, and the threats they face in the future, are no tragedy. This was no tragedy, as if he had been inexplicably struck down by the fates, like a figure who falls on the stage in a Sophocles play. The repetitive beat of justification and exculpation left no doubt in that little girl that even those who could swear that they had not committed the actual act of killing, and certainly had no intention to kill, had their hands deep in his death. Or a truth of sorts.Įven to the child I was then, the song conveyed the miserable inadequacy of reducing responsibility to something uniquely borne by individuals who malevolently commit bad actions. And, of course, they are each telling the truth. They were just doing what it is that they do: going to the fight, organising the fight, writing about the fight, throwing the punches, and so on. Each, in turn, responds “Not I”, and explains that they cannot rightfully be accused of killing Davey Moore. Each verse begins with the refrain, “Who killed Davey Moore?” In the verse that follows, some group or individual associated with his life and death – the coach, the crowd, the manager, the gambling man, the boxing writer, the other fighter – gives their answer. The song explores the question of who bore responsibility for the death of an African American boxer who was killed in the ring when he was just 30 years old. Pete’s voice imploring an answer to that question would ring out from the record player in the living room and across the house.
On it was his rendition of a Bob Dylan song called Who Killed Davey Moore. W hen I was growing up, one of my parents’ favourite albums was a live recording of a Pete Seeger concert called We Shall Overcome.
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