It has certainly been a memorable few days here in Korea. Derek Lande was over and we spent a long weekend doing BP coaching with a bunch of university students. I really enjoyed the few days we did. It was nice to feel that I was doing the type of stuff that I came here to do and the attitude of the students was excellent. I am certainly not an authority on BP or debating in the same class as Derek, but I thought I was a useful asset nevertheless.

Hanging with Derek was also good banter. I caught up on some debating gossip and generally got to chat about how things have been ticking along since I have been away. Derek is usually a proper social butterfly at debating events so having some extended conversations with him was a pleasure.

However, I have also been astonished and appalled in the last few days about the news of WWE wrestler Chris Benoit. Essentially, last weekend the wrestler Chris Benoit murdered his wife and seven year old son, and then hung himself. This came as an incredible shock to me as I have been watching him wrestle, or fake fight if you will for nearly ten years now. (Pro wrestling has been one of my guilty pleasures for a long time.)

In the fake world of professional wrestling, Chris Benoit always portrayed a very gritty and realistic character. He was a genuinely tough guy, who possessed the consummate skill to make even hardened viewers suspend their disbelief and get caught up in the action. Outside of the ring, the impression was that Benoit was a reserved, but classy and dignified family man. Indeed, he was universally respected, if not loved as one of the greatest wrestlers of his generation and a fundamentally sound man. He was famous for a touching moment where he embraced his friend Eddie Guerrero at the superbowl of wrestling, Wrestlemania, where they both finished the event as champions.

That just makes the news all the more shocking and perverse. In an age of 24 hour news, where the graphic nature of the horrors of the human condition are so well covered, we have a tendency to become numb and blot out the tragedy and the horror. If we were to truly comprehend every child murder, every accident, every war, we simply could not get on with things. However, my emotional investment in wrestling has punctured this defensive aura to an extent. I just cannot comprehend what makes a man smother his own seven year old son. Not least a man I have watched for this long.

The US media are playing up the steroid aspect and while steroids certainly amplify aggression, this was clearly an act of blatant psychotic evil, not the same as a gym rat raging about not getting his favorite seat in the sauna. I just wonder how a lot of the wrestlers and employees go on from this. Thinking of Benoit, not as trusted friend and colleague, but as a child murderer.

Regardless, I have not been profoundly upset or anything, but I have been affected by the news at least. Funny old world.